How can I rotate the axis for a polar plot?

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Hi,
Would anyone know how to adjust (rotate) the polar plot function such that the vertical axis starts at 0 degrees - as opposed to 90?
theta=0:0.1:2*pi;
e=cos(theta);
polar(theta,e);
Kind regards,

Accepted Answer

Geoff Hayes
Geoff Hayes on 7 Apr 2015
See the answer at http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/93690-how-do-i-rotate-or-flip-a-polar-plot which changes the viewpoint specification using view. For your case, you would want to call (after the polar plot has been created)
view([90 -90])
  2 Comments
Toshia M
Toshia M on 9 Jul 2025
Starting in R2016a, you can create a PolarAxes object that has properties you can customize. To rotate a PolarAxes object, set the ThetaZeroLocation property. By default, the zero angle is located to the right of the origin.
The ThetaZeroLocation property accepts four string values ("top", "bottom", "left", or "right"). Starting in R2025a, you can specify this property as an arbitrary angle.
For example, create a polar plot and set the ThetaZeroLocation property to pi/4 radians.
(The default theta axis units is degrees, so if you specify an angle in radians, you need to set the ThetaAxisUnits to "radians".)
pax = polaraxes;
theta = linspace(0,6*pi);
rho = theta/10;
polarplot(pax,theta,rho)
% Specify radians for theta axis
pax.ThetaAxisUnits = "radians";
% Rotate by pi/4 radians
pax.ThetaZeroLocation = pi/4;
See the polaraxes documentation for more information.

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More Answers (1)

Steve Snarski
Steve Snarski on 25 Sep 2019
Use axes properties. To rotate theta = 0 from right side [default] to bottom use following:
set(gca,'ThetaZeroLocation','bottom')

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