MATLAB: Does creating a new plot reset the axes properties

axescleardefaultMATLABplotpropertiesresettag

I am running into an issue where I set some axes properties in my figure window, but then when I go to plot the axes is reset to it's default properties. Why is this happening?
How can I set the axes properties before plotting and have them stay in effect?
Please see the following simplified reproduction code:
f = figure();
ax = axes(f);
ax.Tag = 'MyAxesTag';
[X,Y,Z] = sphere(16);
x = [0.5*X(:); 0.75*X(:); X(:)];
y = [0.5*Y(:); 0.75*Y(:); Y(:)];
z = [0.5*Z(:); 0.75*Z(:); Z(:)];
disp(['The Axes Tag before scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])
scatter3(ax,x,y,z)
disp(['The Axes Tag after scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])

Best Answer

This behavior is expected, the 'plot' command resets the axes properties before plotting.
There are two ways of resolving this:
  1. You can change this behavior using the 'hold' command,
  2. You can manually toggle the NextPlot property to 'replacechildren' or 'add' (this is how 'hold on' is implemented).
% Example 1 - Using the hold command
f = figure();
ax = axes(f);
ax.Tag = 'MyAxesTag';
[X,Y,Z] = sphere(16);
x = [0.5*X(:); 0.75*X(:); X(:)];
y = [0.5*Y(:); 0.75*Y(:); Y(:)];
z = [0.5*Z(:); 0.75*Z(:); Z(:)];
disp(['The Axes Tag before scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])
hold(ax,'on')
scatter3(ax,x,y,z)
disp(['The Axes Tag after scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])
The hold command allows for the retention of the current plots when creating new plots. For more information, please see:
https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/hold.html
% Example 2 - using the NextPlot property
f = figure();
ax = axes(f);
ax.Tag = 'MyAxesTag';
[X,Y,Z] = sphere(16);
x = [0.5*X(:); 0.75*X(:); X(:)];
y = [0.5*Y(:); 0.75*Y(:); Y(:)];
z = [0.5*Z(:); 0.75*Z(:); Z(:)];
disp(['The Axes Tag before scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])
ax.NextPlot = 'add'
scatter3(ax,x,y,z)
disp(['The Axes Tag after scatter3 is: ', ax.Tag])
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