funkyheatmap - Visualising data frames with mixed data types (2025)

This paper introduces funkyheatmap, a tool to visualize data frames with mixed data types in a flexible and informative way.

Cannoodt, R., Deconinck, L., Couckuyt, A., Markov, N. S., Zappia, L., Luecken, M. D., Interlandi, M., Saeys, Y.†, & Saelens, W.† (2025).

funkyheatmap: Visualising data frames with mixed data types. Journal of Open Source Software, 10(108), 7698.

This paper introduces funkyheatmap, an R package for visualizing data frames containing heterogeneous (i.e., mixed) data types. It enables users to construct clean and expressive heatmaps that preserve data semantics while maintaining customizability and extensibility. The tool is particularly suited for exploratory data analysis in multi-modal and single-cell experiments.

https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.07698

Abstract: This article presents the funkyheatmap package for visualizing data frames with mixed data types in a compact, customizable, and extensible way. It uses the ggplot2 grammar of graphics under the hood and supports multiple layout strategies, enabling clear and expressive visual representations. The tool is particularly useful for data sets with a mix of numerical, categorical, and binary annotations, and finds application in areas like quality control, data summaries, and integrated visualization of multi-omics data.

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