QGIS: Label Toolbar

  • OS: Linux, Windows
  • Version: 3.x

This is less a tutorial and just a brief run down of the label Toolbar. There is also a small description on what each tools does.

From left to right on the toolbar.

  • Layer Labeling Options: Brings up the options menu. This is the same as right-clicking on the layer and choosing Properties, Labels
  • Layer Diagram Options
  • Highlight Pinned Labels: Shows or hides a shaded ‘outline’ box around the labels that have been manually moved.
  • Pin/Unpin Labels: Changes a label from ‘auto’ label settings to manual label settings.
  • Show/Hide Labels: Displays (Click) or hides (Shift-Click) the label for the feature you click.
  • Move Label: Allows you to change the position of the label. Changing the position will “Pin” the label as well.
  • Rotate Label: Allows you to change the rotation of the label.
  • Change Label: Brings up additional options to change the particular label you clicked.

Once you start using the labeling toolbar it will ask you to “relate” or join it back to the layer that’s labeled. When You start moving labels it’s going to store the settings in the .qgd file that is stored with the qgs file in the qgz file (when you save your project).

                                                                 A QGZ file uncompressed

The label bar has gotten very powerful in the 3 series. Once you start manipulating the label, qgis starts filling out attributes in the qgd file. You still have the option of manually adding fields in your data file if you want to control label placement. Note all the Auxillary Storage parameters below:

                                                                                                                   Fields added to the QGD File to control label placement.

In order to add labels you click the first icon on the toolbar. When you press that the styling toolbar will open and you can display a label. In this case I assigned “label_number”.

 

Once you have a label it’s just a matter or clicking on the toolbar and adjusting the labels. By clicking your mouse and holding down the shift you can turn off labels on some of your data by either clicking the label or dragging a bounding box over the label. To bring a label back just click on it with the show/hide label button pressed without pressing click.

                                                                                                                Hiding labels

 

When you click “Move Label” you can drag labels to a better position:

 

Overall the label toolbar is fairly simple to use – but still a great addition to QGIS for cartographic map output.