If you've ever tried to include Mathematica figures in a LaTeX document, you know the frustration. The default export options—PNG, PDF, EPS—create figures that look out of place. The fonts don't match your document, the line weights feel wrong, and any attempt to edit them later means going back to Mathematica.
TikZ and pgfplots offer a better path: vector graphics that use your document's fonts, scale perfectly, and remain fully editable. The problem? Getting your Mathematica output into TikZ format isn't straightforward.
The Missing Tool
For years, a package called Mathematica2Tikz promised to solve this. Listed on the Wolfram Library Archive, it was supposed to be the Mathematica equivalent of the popular matlab2tikz tool. But if you've tried to download it recently, you've discovered the same thing everyone else has: the download link has been broken since at least 2017. The file was apparently never uploaded, or was removed.
Users on Mathematica Stack Exchange and the Wolfram Community have been asking about alternatives ever since. The existing solutions are limited:
- Export to PDF, then manually trace: Time-consuming and defeats the purpose
- Export coordinates and rebuild in pgfplots: Works for simple plots, tedious for anything complex
- ContourExport package: Only handles contour plots specifically
- Graph-to-TikZiT converters: Only for graph theory visualizations, not function plots
None of these handle the common case: converting your existing Plot[], LogPlot[], or ListPlot[] calls directly to pgfplots code.
Why Native TikZ Matters
When you include a Mathematica-exported PDF in your LaTeX document, you get:
- Embedded fonts that don't match your document
- Fixed text sizes that don't scale with your layout
- A black box you can't edit without the original .nb file
When you use native TikZ/pgfplots code, you get:
- Consistent typography: Labels use your document's font (Computer Modern, Times, whatever you've chosen)
- Perfect scaling: Resize the figure and everything scales proportionally—lines, text, markers
- Full editability: Tweak colors, labels, and styling directly in your .tex file
- Smaller file sizes: Data points rather than rendered pixels
- Version control friendly: Text-based format works with Git and diff tools
For academic publications, this difference is immediately visible. Reviewers and readers notice when figures look like foreign objects pasted into a document versus integral parts of it.
Our Conversion Service
At LODE Publishing, we handle Mathematica-to-TikZ conversion as part of our manuscript preparation services. Whether you have a handful of figures or an entire thesis worth of plots, we convert them to clean, editable pgfplots code that integrates seamlessly with your document.
Supported plot types:
Plot[]— standard 2D function plotsLogPlot[]— semi-logarithmic y-axisLogLinearPlot[]— semi-logarithmic x-axisLogLogPlot[]— double logarithmic axes- Multiple functions per plot with automatic legend generation
Preserved formatting:
- Axis labels (
AxesLabel,FrameLabel) - Plot titles (
PlotLabel) - Legends with proper positioning (
PlotLegends,Placed) - Plot ranges and aspect ratios
- Grid lines
The output is clean pgfplots code with separate data files—easy to version control, easy to tweak, and guaranteed to match your document's typography.
When to Convert
Consider TikZ conversion when:
- You're preparing a thesis or dissertation with many Mathematica figures
- You're submitting to a journal that requires vector graphics
- You want figures that remain editable after you've moved on from Mathematica
- You need consistent styling across figures from different sources (Mathematica, MATLAB, Python)
If you're working on a publication and want figures that integrate properly with your LaTeX document, get in touch. We'll handle the technical conversion so you can focus on your content.
