A Python interface for the Generic Mapping Tools.
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Why PyGMT?
A beautiful map is worth a thousand words. To truly understand how powerful PyGMT is, play with it online on Binder! For a quicker introduction, check out our 3 minute overview!
Afterwards, feel free to look at our Tutorials, visit the Gallery, and check out some external PyGMT examples!
About
PyGMT is a library for processing geospatial and geophysical data and making publication-quality maps and figures. It provides a Pythonic interface for the Generic Mapping Tools (GMT), a command-line program widely used across the Earth, Ocean, and Planetary sciences and beyond.
Project goals
- Make GMT more accessible to new users.
- Build a Pythonic API for GMT.
- Interface with the GMT C API directly using ctypes (no system calls).
- Support for rich display in the Jupyter notebook.
- Integration with the scientific Python ecosystem:
numpy.ndarray or pandas.DataFrame for data tables, xarray.DataArray for grids,
and geopandas.GeoDataFrame for geographical data.
Quickstart
Installation
Simple installation using mamba:
mamba install --channel conda-forge pygmtIf you use conda:
conda install --channel conda-forge pygmtFor other ways to install pygmt, see the full installation instructions.
Getting started
As a starting point, you can open a Python interpreter or a Jupyter notebook, and try the following example:
python
import pygmt
fig = pygmt.Figure() fig.basemap(projection="R7c", region=[0, 360, -90, 90], frame=True) fig.coast(land="tan", water="lightblue") fig.text(position="MC", text="PyGMT", f) fig.show()
You should see a global map with land and water masses colored in tan and lightblue, respectively. On top, there should be the semi-transparent text "PyGMT". For more examples, please have a look at the Gallery and Tutorials.
Contacting us
- Most discussion happens on GitHub.
- We have a Discourse forum
Contributing
Code of conduct
Please note that this project is released with a Contributor Code of Conduct. By participating in this project you agree to abide by its terms.
Contributing guidelines
Please read our Contributing Guide to see how you can help and give feedback.
Imposter syndrome disclaimer
We want your help. No, really.
There may be a little voice inside your head that is telling you that you're not ready to be an open source contributor; that your skills aren't nearly good enough to contribute. What could you possibly offer?
We assure you that the little voice in your head is wrong.
Being a contributor doesn't just mean writing code. Equally important contributions include: writing or proof-reading documentation, suggesting or implementing tests, or even giving feedback about the project (including giving feedback about the contribution process). If you're coming to the project with fresh eyes, you might see the errors and assumptions that seasoned contributors have glossed over. If you can write any code at all, you can contribute code to open source. We are constantly trying out new skills, making mistakes, and learning from those mistakes. That's how we all improve and we are happy to help others learn.
This disclaimer was adapted from the MetPy project.
Citing PyGMT
PyGMT is a community developed project. See the AUTHORS.md file on GitHub for a list of the people involved and a definition of the term "PyGMT Developers".
Feel free to cite our work in your research. You can either cite the PyGMT paper published in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems or the Zenodo archive of the PyGMT software.
The BibTeX entry for the PyGMT paper is:
@article{pygmt20262026GC013105, author = {Tian, Dongdong and Fröhlich, Yvonne and Leong, Wei Ji and Grund, Michael and Schlitzer, William and Jones, Max and Uieda, Leonardo and Luis, Joaquim M. F.}, title = {{PyGMT: Bridging Python and the Generic Mapping Tools for Geospatial Visualization and Analysis}}, journal = {Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems}, year = 2026, volume = {27}, pages = {e2019GC008515}, doi = {10.1029/2019GC008515}, }@software{ pygmt202619398871, author = {Tian, Dongdong and Leong, Wei Ji and Fröhlich, Yvonne and Grund, Michael and Schlitzer, William and Jones, Max and Toney, Liam and Yao, Jiayuan and Tong, Jing-Hui and Magen, Yohai and Materna, Kathryn and Belem, Andre and Newton, Tyler and Anant, Abhishek and Ziebarth, Malte and Quinn, Jamie and He, Xingchen and Uieda, Leonardo and Wessel, Paul}, title = {{PyGMT: A Python interface for the Generic Mapping Tools}}, month = jul, year = 2026, publisher = {Zenodo}, version = {0.19.0}, doi = {10.5281/zenodo.19398871}, url = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19398871} }To cite a specific version of PyGMT, go to our Zenodo page at dimfilter, surface, and x2sys also have their dedicated citations. Further information for all these can be found at
License
PyGMT is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the BSD 3-clause License. A copy of this license is provided in LICENSE.txt.
Support
The development of PyGMT has been supported by NSF grants OCE-1558403 and EAR-1948602.
Related projects
Other official wrappers for GMT:
Minimum supported versions
PyGMT has adopted SPEC 0 alongside the rest of the scientific Python ecosystem, and made a few extensions based on the needs of the project. Please see Minimum Supported Versions for the detailed policy and the minimum supported versions of GMT, Python and core package dependencies.
