How to Adjust Your X-Axis Labels in a Time Series Graph for R programming

Adjust the scale labels on your time series using ggplot

In a time series, it is sometimes necessary to adjust the scale along the x-axis. You have data in which a given R program will set a default label in a way that you do not want. It’s a feature in R programming — The program is adjusting the way the time series data is identified. Yet you have a preference in how it is shown.

Well, there is a way to adjust that label using the ggplot library.

In a previous post on time series data, I showed steps for creating a time series using ggplot.

Within the example in the post is an additional ggplot parameter function called scale_x_date(). which allows you to format the dates along the x-axis.

With just a graph from ggplot, the output allows a time series plot according to a default date scale picked by the program. It would look like the following — note the years on the x-axis…

People don’t normally identify years by .5 or call 2021 “2021.0”. Maybe on Star Trek…but not in current life.