Cumulative histograms in Matplotlib - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Cumulative histograms

📖 Scenario: You are analyzing the daily sales numbers of a small store over a week. You want to understand how sales accumulate over the days.

🎯 Goal: Create a cumulative histogram using matplotlib to visualize the accumulation of sales over the week.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a list called daily_sales with exact sales numbers for 7 days

Create a variable called bins to define histogram bins

Use plt.hist() with cumulative=True to create a cumulative histogram

Display the histogram with plt.show()

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Cumulative histograms help businesses see how quantities add up over time or categories, like total sales or accumulated customers.

💼 Career

Data analysts and scientists use cumulative histograms to understand trends and distributions in data for better decision-making.

1

Create the daily sales data

Create a list called daily_sales with these exact values: 5, 8, 6, 10, 7, 9, 4 representing sales for 7 days.

Matplotlib

# Create the daily_sales list with the exact values
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use square brackets [] to create a list and separate numbers with commas.

2

Define histogram bins

Create a variable called bins and set it to a list with these exact values: 0, 3, 6, 9, 12 to define the histogram bins.

Matplotlib

daily_sales = [5, 8, 6, 10, 7, 9, 4]
# Create the bins list with the exact values
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Bins are the edges for grouping data in the histogram. Use a list with the exact numbers.

3

Create the cumulative histogram

Import matplotlib.pyplot as plt. Then use plt.hist() with daily_sales, bins, and cumulative=True to create a cumulative histogram.

Matplotlib

daily_sales = [5, 8, 6, 10, 7, 9, 4]
bins = [0, 3, 6, 9, 12]
# Import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
# Create cumulative histogram with plt.hist()
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use import matplotlib.pyplot as plt to import. Then call plt.hist() with the right arguments.

4

Display the histogram

Use plt.show() to display the cumulative histogram plot.

Matplotlib

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
daily_sales = [5, 8, 6, 10, 7, 9, 4]
bins = [0, 3, 6, 9, 12]
plt.hist(daily_sales, bins=bins, cumulative=True)
# Display the plot
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Call plt.show() to open the plot window and see the histogram.