Choroplethr

Choroplethr is a suite of R packages I wrote that facilitates mapping demographic statistics. The name “Choroplethr” comes from combining the words “choropleth map” and “R programming language”. A choropleth is any map that shows regions, and expresses values for those regions with color.

Choroplethr is easy to use, has built-in support for mapping every country in the world and integrates with several open data sources, such as the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS). It has been downloaded over 250k times.

Getting Started

The following code snippet will install choroplethr and create a simple map:

install.packages("choroplethr")
library(choroplethr)

data(df_pop_county)
county_choropleth(df_pop_county,
    title = "2012 County Population Estimates",
    legend = "Population")

Talk

The video below, which is based on a talk I gave at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), gives a comprehensive overview of the project.

Courses

I have created three courses which give detailed instructions on how to use various aspects of of Choroplethr. The first two courses previously sold for $99 each, but are now available for free.

Mapmaking in R with Choroplethr. This course is the definitive guide to working with Choroplethr. It teaches you how to conduct exploratory analysis with Choroplethr, as well as how to use each of the maps that Choroplethr ships with.
Shapefiles for R Programmers. This course teaches you how to work with Shapefiles in R. This is especially useful if you need to work with maps that are not already packaged on CRAN.
Mapping Census Bureau Data in R with Choroplethr. I worked with the Census Bureau to create a free 18-part video course on using Choroplethr to Analyze US Census Bureau Data. If you are already familiar with Choroplethr, I recommend starting with Module 4 (“Data Details”).

Asking Questions

If you have a technical question related to Choroplethr, I recommend asking on Stack Overflow. Please tag your question with the keyword “choroplethr”. (Click here to see past questions).

Ari Lamstein