How to move or position a legend in ggplot2

Question

I\'m trying to create a ggplot2 plot with the legend beneath the plot.

The ggplot2 book says on p 112 \"The position and justification of legends are controlled by t

Answer 1

In newer versions of ggplot2, you can use + theme(legend.position='bottom').

qplot(VarX,VarY, data=myDat, shape=Descrip) + 
  theme(legend.position='bottom')

See Cookbook for R - Legends for more legends goodness.

In response to a comment, theme_update() doesn't kick in if invoked in the middle of a ggplot (as in + theme_update(), only subsequent times. It also modifies the active theme rather than just the specific plot. So you could do this:

theme_update(legend.position='bottom')
qplot(VarX,VarY, data=myDat, shape=Descrip) 

with results as above, with the difference being that subsequent plots will also default to legend on bottom.