10.14: Saving and Opening Figures

Fundamentals of MATLAB Programming · LibreTexts

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    From LibreTexts, under CC BY-NC-SA, as the source states it; its equations are written in TeX, which the PDF shows typeset. This page at LibreTexts.

    Sometimes you may want to save a MATLAB figure so that you can reopen and edit it later. MATLAB figure files use the .fig extension.

    Example \(\PageIndex{1}\)

    Saving a plot and opening an existing plot.

    clear; clc; clf;

x = linspace(1, 10, 30);
y = x.^2;

plot(x, y, 'md')
title('y = x^2')
xlabel('x')
ylabel('y')
grid on

% Save the current figure
savefig('myplot.fig')

% Close all open figure windows
close all

% Reopen the saved figure
openfig('myplot.fig')
    Solution

    After running the code in MATLAB, notice that a new file called myplot.fig appears in the current working directory.

    The generated plot:

    clipboard_ebc875b98ab27fece32990a5e01f76fc8.png

    A .fig file is useful when you want to reopen the figure in MATLAB and continue editing it. If you want to include a plot in a report, you may also export it as an image file, such as PNG, or copy it directly into your document.

    This page titled 10.14: Saving and Opening Figures was last modified on Tue, 30 Jun 2026 02:11:47 GMT and is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Zara Noroozi.