Minimum version of dependencies policy#
For the purpose of this document, 'minor version' is in the sense of SemVer (major, minor, patch) and includes both major and minor releases. For projects that use date-based versioning, every release is a 'minor version'.
Matplotlib follows NEP 29.
Python and NumPy#
Matplotlib supports:
All minor versions of Python released 42 months prior to the project, and at minimum the two latest minor versions.
All minor versions of
numpyreleased in the 24 months prior to the project, and at minimum the last three minor versions.
In setup.py, the python_requires variable should be set to
the minimum supported version of Python. All supported minor
versions of Python should be in the test matrix and have binary
artifacts built for the release.
Minimum Python and NumPy version support should be adjusted upward on every major and minor release, but never on a patch release.
See also the List of dependency versions.
Python dependencies#
For Python dependencies we should support at least:
- with compiled extensions
minor versions initially released in the 24 months prior to our planned release date or the oldest that support our minimum Python + NumPy
- without compiled extensions
minor versions initially released in the 12 months prior to our planned release date or the oldest that supports our minimum Python.
We will only bump these dependencies as we need new features or the old versions no longer support our minimum NumPy or Python.
Test and documentation dependencies#
As these packages are only needed for testing or building the docs and not needed by end-users, we can be more aggressive about dropping support for old versions. However, we need to be careful to not over-run what down-stream packagers support (as most of the run the tests and build the documentation as part of the packaging process).
We will support at least minor versions of the development dependencies released in the 12 months prior to our planned release.
We will only bump these as needed or versions no longer support our minimum Python and NumPy.
System and C-dependencies#
For system or C-dependencies (FreeType, GUI frameworks, LaTeX, Ghostscript, FFmpeg) support as old as practical. These can be difficult to install for end-users and we want to be usable on as many systems as possible. We will bump these on a case-by-case basis.
List of dependency versions#
The following list shows the minimal versions of Python and NumPy dependencies for different versions of Matplotlib. Follow the links for the full specification of the dependencies.
Matplotlib |
Python |
NumPy |
|---|---|---|
3.8 |
1.19.0 |
|
3.7 |
1.17.0 |
|
3.7 |
1.16.0 |
|
3.6 |
1.15.0 |
|
3.6 |
1.11.0 |
|
3.6 |
1.11.0 |
|
3.5 |
1.10.0 |
|
2.7, 3.4 |
1.7.1 |
|
2.7, 3.4 |
1.7.1 |
|
2.7, 3.4 |
1.7.1 |
|
2.7, 3.4 |
1.6 |
|
2.6, 3.3 |
1.6 |
|
2.6, 3.3 |
1.5 |
|
1.2 |
2.6, 3.1 |
1.4 |
1.1 |
2.4 |
1.1 |
1.0 |
2.4 |
1.1 |