A default plot is for looking; a figure is for print. This lesson is the finishing pass: pin the ranges, control the tics, place the key, and — when one panel isn’t enough — use multiplot.

Step 1 — Pin the ranges

Autoscaling moves whenever the data changes. Once a figure is near-final, freeze it:

set xrange [0:10]
set yrange [0:1.05]
set xlabel "Dose (mg)"
set ylabel "Response"
plot x/(2.0+x) linewidth 2 title "saturation model"

A pinned range means a data tweak between drafts can’t silently rescale the figure your text already describes.

Step 2 — Tics that read well

set xrange [0:10]
set yrange [0:1.05]
set xtics 0,2,10
set ytics 0,0.25
set mxtics 2
set grid ytics
plot x/(2.0+x) linewidth 2 title "saturation model"

set xtics 0,2,10 is start,step,end; mxtics adds minor tics between them. Sparse labelled tics with minor tics between reads better at column width than a crowded axis.

Step 3 — Put the key where the data isn’t

set key top left
set key box opaque samplen 2

Or remove it entirely with unset key when a single curve is already explained by the caption — journals prefer captions to legends for one-curve figures.

Step 4 — Two panels with multiplot

multiplot splits the canvas; each panel is its own plot with its own labels:

set multiplot layout 2,1
set ylabel "Signal"
unset xlabel
plot sin(x)*exp(-x/8) linewidth 2 title "damped"
set ylabel "Residual"
set xlabel "Time (s)"
plot sin(x)*exp(-x/8) - sin(x)*exp(-x/7.5) linewidth 2 notitle
unset multiplot

layout 2,1 stacks two rows; settings persist between panels, so change only what differs (here the y-label, and the x-label appears only on the bottom panel — shared-axis convention).

Step 5 — Export or insert

Export / Insert as always: vector PDF or into the paper with a \label. For panels that come from different tools (a Gnuplot plot next to a diagram), export each figure separately and arrange them in Compose instead of multiplot.

Tip: set samples 500 is still worth setting in the final pass — a smooth model curve that renders slightly faceted at screen size will print visibly segmented at 600 dpi.