LaTeX Figures

Figures are the basic environment for inserting tabular or graphical content.

Usage

To insert a graphic, try using a figure together with the graphicx package:

\begin{figure}[h]
  \includegraphics{foo}
\end{figure}

Figures take a mandatory positioning option, like h in the example above. Valid values and their meanings are:

To center a figure, use the \centering command.

Captions

Captions are added using the \caption command.

\begin{figure}[h]
  \centering
  \caption{Hello, world!}
  \includegraphics{foo}
\end{figure}

Subfigures

For advanced options such as side-by-side positioning, some number of subfigures must be created within an overarching figure.

\usepackage{graphicx}
\usepackage{subcaption}

% ...

\begin{figure}
\centering
\begin{subfigure}{.5\textwidth}
  \centering
  \includegraphics{foo}
\end{subfigure}
~ % inserted for spacing: any of `~`, `\quad`, `\qquad`, `\hfill`, etc will work
\begin{subfigure}{.5\textwidth}
  \centering
  \includegraphics{bar}
\end{subfigure}
\end{figure}

Labels

To create references within a document, as in:

See figure~\ref{fig:test} on page~\pageref{fig:test}.

Use the \label command within figures. Figures should always use labels like fig:name.

Note that the \label command must follow the \caption command (if used), and must be encapsulated in the figure (rather than follow it).

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