Cowplot `plot_grid` producing (far) too much whitespace when ggplot aspect ratio is changed

[mjandrews]

This code produces the cowplot grid shown below.

library(tidyverse)
library(cowplot)


plot_1 <- tibble(x = rnorm(25),
                 y = rnorm(25)) %>% 
  ggplot(aes(x = x, y = y)) + 
  geom_point() 

plot_grid(plot_1, plot_1, labels=c('a', 'b'))

But let's say I want to change the aspect ratio. Easily done, or so I thought, with ggplot's theme.

plot_2 <- plot_1 + theme(aspect.ratio = 1/2)

plot_grid(plot_2, plot_2, labels=c('a', 'b'))

But the result is this.

I also tried

plot_3 <- plot_1 + coord_fixed(ratio=1/2)
plot_grid(plot_3, plot_3, labels=c('a', 'b')) 

But the results are the same.

The labels are where they were in the original. I want them plots to be just under the labels and none of the whitespace.

[jcblum]

I have encountered the same problem! I’m not sure if it’s a bug, or expected behavior (I guess the best way to answer that might be to post a good reproducible example — like yours! — to the github issues).

My workaround was to stop setting aspect ratio via ggplot2, and instead set it elsewhere: within the chunk options (for R Markdown) or via cowplot::save_plot (for general output to file).

[mjandrews]

Thanks for your help. I will start an issue at GitHub and hope that that will lead to some insight.