Here, we show how to make dot plots and stacked dot plots in R, and set title, labels, colors, fonts and offsets.

These are done with the dotchart() and stripchart() functions.

See plots & charts and point types & sizes for graphical parameters and other plots and charts.

1 Create a Simple Dot Plot in R

Enter the data by hand: 

Food = c(22.2, 44.5, 59.6, 73.2, 86.8)
Household = c(10.5, 15.5, 29.0, 36.5, 46.2)
Medical = c(3.53, 5.76, 9.71, 14.0, 21.1)

Expense = as.matrix(cbind(Food, Household, Medical))
rownames(Expense) = c("1940", "1945", "1950", "1955", "1960")
colnames(Expense) = c("Food", "Household", "Medical")

Expense
     Food Household Medical
1940 22.2      10.5    3.53
1945 44.5      15.5    5.76
1950 59.6      29.0    9.71
1955 73.2      36.5   14.00
1960 86.8      46.2   21.10

You can then create a simple dot plot with the dotchart() function:

dotchart(Expense, main = "Simple Dot Plot")
Example 1: Simple Dot Plot in R

Example 1: Simple Dot Plot in R

Or transpose the data with the t() function to change the factor hierarchy:

dotchart(t(Expense), main = "Simple Dot Plot")
Example 2: Simple Dot Plot in R

Example 2: Simple Dot Plot in R

2 Set Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, and Fonts of a Dot Plot in R

Here we set details such as title (main), x-axis and y-axis labels (xlab, ylab), colors (col), dot type (pch), font types (font), and font sizes (cex). See also setting colors and fonts for more details.

See Expense data above.

dotchart(Expense,
         main = "Dot Plot of Expense",
         xlab = "Amount (in billions of Dollars)",
         ylab = "Year by Sector",
         col = "purple",
         col.main="blue", col.lab="green",
         pch = 12,
         font=1, font.lab=4, font.main=2,
         cex.main=1.5, cex.lab=1.2, cex=1)
Dot Plot with Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, Fonts Set in R

Dot Plot with Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, Fonts Set in R

3 Create a Stacked Dot Plot in R

Enter the data by hand: 

Dotdata = c(31, 30, 34, 25, 30, 32, 26, 31, 27, 28,
            32, 29, 31, 27, 28, 25, 31, 32, 31, 26,
            26, 35, 34, 25, 32, 27, 31, 26, 32, 33,
            27, 34, 27, 32, 28, 30, 25, 26, 33, 26)

You can then create a stacked dot plot with the stripchart() function:

The "method" argument is set to "stack". The second plot has the argument "offset = 1" to add spaces between the dots, and the argument "at = 0" to shift the dots downwards.

stripchart(Dotdata, method = "stack")
stripchart(Dotdata, method = "stack", offset = 1, at = 0)
Example 1: Stacked Dot Plot in R

Example 1: Stacked Dot Plot in R

Using a Data Object:

Using the InsectSprays data from the "datasets" package with some sub-setting and filtering.

Sample rows from the InsectSprays data:

InsectSprays
   count spray
1     10     A
15    21     B
32     1     C
43     5     D
44     5     D
51     3     E
52     5     E
55     1     E
68    10     F
72    13     F
stripchart(InsectSprays$count, method = "stack", offset = 1, at = 0)

Or:

Counts = InsectSprays[,"count"]
stripchart(Counts, method = "stack", offset = 1, at = 0)
Example 2: Stacked Dot Plot in R

Example 2: Stacked Dot Plot in R

4 Set Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, Fonts, and Offset of a Stacked Dot Plot in R

Similarly, to the example above, we set details.

stripchart(InsectSprays$count, method = "stack", offset=1, at = 0,
           main = "Dot Plot of Insect Sprays",
           xlab = "Count of Insects",
           ylab = "Frequency",
           col = "purple",
           col.main="blue", col.lab="green",
           pch = 19,
           font=1, font.lab=3, font.main=2,
           cex.main=1.65, cex.lab=1.2, cex=1)
Stacked Dot Plot with Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, Fonts, Offset Set in R

Stacked Dot Plot with Title, Labels, Colors, Dot Type, Fonts, Offset Set in R

5 Stacked Dot Plot by Variable or Group in R

You can create a stacked dot plot by a variable by specifying the variable of interest. You can also add details to the dot plot as in the examples above.

stripchart(InsectSprays$count ~ InsectSprays$spray, method = "stack")
Stacked Dot Plot by Factor in R

Stacked Dot Plot by Factor in R

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