ggplot - Multiple legends arrangement

Question

I want to arrange mutiple legend in ggplot with multiple rows and columns. However currently, from the documentation I can only decide there direction or manipulate rows/col

Answer 1

The idea is to create each plot individually (color, fill & size) then extract their legends and combine them in a desired way together with the main plot.

See more about the cowplot package here & the patchwork package here

library(ggplot2)
library(cowplot)   # get_legend() & plot_grid() functions
library(patchwork) # blank plot: plot_spacer()

data <- seq(1000, 4000, by = 1000)
colorScales <- c("#c43b3b", "#80c43b", "#3bc4c4", "#7f3bc4")
names(colorScales) <- data

# Original plot without legend
p0 <- ggplot() +
  geom_point(aes(x = data, y = data, 
                 color = as.character(data), fill = data, size = data),
             shape = 21
  ) +
  scale_color_manual(
    name = "Legend 1",
    values = colorScales
  ) +
  scale_fill_gradientn(
    name = "Legend 2",
    limits = c(0, max(data)),
    colours = rev(c("#000000", "#FFFFFF", "#BA0000")),
    values = c(0, 0.5, 1)
  ) +
  scale_size_continuous(name = "Legend 3") +
  theme(legend.direction = "vertical", legend.box = "horizontal") +
  theme(legend.position = "none")

# color only
p1 <- ggplot() +
  geom_point(aes(x = data, y = data, color = as.character(data)),
             shape = 21
  ) +
  scale_color_manual(
    name = "Legend 1",
    values = colorScales
  ) +
  theme(legend.direction = "vertical", legend.box = "vertical")

# fill only
p2 <- ggplot() +
  geom_point(aes(x = data, y = data, fill = data),
             shape = 21
  ) +
  scale_fill_gradientn(
    name = "Legend 2",
    limits = c(0, max(data)),
    colours = rev(c("#000000", "#FFFFFF", "#BA0000")),
    values = c(0, 0.5, 1)
  ) +
  theme(legend.direction = "vertical", legend.box = "vertical")

# size only
p3 <- ggplot() +
  geom_point(aes(x = data, y = data, size = data),
             shape = 21
  ) +
  scale_size_continuous(name = "Legend 3") +
  theme(legend.direction = "vertical", legend.box = "vertical")

Get all legends

leg1 <- get_legend(p1)
leg2 <- get_legend(p2)
leg3 <- get_legend(p3)

# create a blank plot for legend alignment 
blank_p <- plot_spacer() + theme_void()

Combine legends

# combine legend 1 & 2
leg12 <- plot_grid(leg1, leg2,
                   blank_p,
                   nrow = 3
)

# combine legend 3 & blank plot
leg30 <- plot_grid(leg3, blank_p,
                   blank_p, 
                   nrow = 3
)

# combine all legends
leg123 <- plot_grid(leg12, leg30,
                    ncol = 2
)

Put everything together

final_p <- plot_grid(p0,
                     leg123,
                     nrow = 1,
                     align = "h",
                     axis = "t",
                     rel_widths = c(1, 0.3)
)

print(final_p)

Created on 2018-08-28 by the reprex package (v0.2.0.9000).