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I have a two column document (using multicol) and want to insert figures so that they do NOT span columns. I have searched around and the only thing I can find says that only figure* is supported which spans the whole page (both columns). Is there a way to get single column figures in a document using multicols?

Caramdir
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bryanp
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    @Sorush: Be aware that LaTeX questions with the programming nature are still on topic on SO. @bryanp: That said, this one doesn't really have the programming nature. You want figure without the *. – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten Feb 27 '11 at 22:00
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    I second this question. I would like to have a figure/table float to the top of the column, like it would using twocolumn instead of multicol (which means that Herbert's answer does not apply). – yo' May 28 '12 at 13:50
  • I should have specified in the bounty that obviously [h]/[H] for "wide" float is a sort of a non-sense and is not needed. – yo' May 28 '12 at 16:35
  • 12 years, since this question and the situation still seems to be the same. I assist @yo' If you wan't LaTeX to position your images, your images must float, which none of the answers provide a solution for. On the other hand: when using the multicols package, your columns will balanced and there will be no new page inserted, when changing from one- to multicolumn. – Jan May 08 '23 at 12:40

3 Answers3

82
\documentclass[a5paper]{article}
\usepackage{multicol,caption}
\usepackage[demo]{graphicx}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\newenvironment{Figure}
  {\par\medskip\noindent\minipage{\linewidth}}
  {\endminipage\par\medskip}
\begin{document}

\begin{multicols}{2}
\lipsum[1]
\begin{Figure}
 \centering
 \includegraphics[width=\linewidth]{foo}
 \captionof{figure}{my caption of the figure}
\end{Figure}

\lipsum[1]
\end{multicols}

\end{document}

enter image description here

Defining a placement option is not possible inside the multicols environment.

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    How would one go about also adding support for the [htbp] placement location specifiers? – G. H. Hardly Sep 18 '13 at 07:13
  • Great stuff +1 I was looking for this solution for a while. At first I used \begingroup & \endgroup for my tikz figures and their captions. Though it was not keeping them together and I had situations where a caption was in a different column than its figure. Thanks again this solved my problem perfectly. – Boro Nov 19 '13 at 23:46
  • @Herbert Sir, are we supposed to insert the picture/ figure on our own in the place of "foo" of "\includegraphics[width=\linewidth]{foo}" ?

    cause I tried to do so, but still black box is coming. What to do?

     – KON3 Sep 01 '14 at 05:57
  • delete the option [demo] for package graphicx –  Sep 01 '14 at 10:11
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    I would also like to know a way to specify placement when using this method (e.g. [t]). Can anyone help? – teeeeee Jul 17 '20 at 14:59
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"One way around this is to not make your floats float. The float package provides the [H] float specifier which avoids this" (Taken form Werner's answer here: https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/75939/182467)

\usepackage{float}
[...]
\begin{figure}[H]
    [...]
\end{figure}
thando
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8

One solution is to use the nonfloat package.

\documentclass[]{article}

\usepackage{nonfloat}
\usepackage{multicol}

\usepackage[demo]{graphicx}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\newcommand\myfigure[1]{%
\medskip\noindent\begin{minipage}{\columnwidth}
\centering%
#1%
%figure,caption, and label go here
\end{minipage}\medskip}

\begin{document}
\begin{multicols}{3}
\lipsum[1]
%
\myfigure{\includegraphics[width=.9\columnwidth]{test}%
\figcaption{\emph{I am a figure caption!}}}
%
\lipsum[1]
\end{multicols}
\end{document}

example output

JohnReed
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  • This answer is meant to address the original question and is not meant to satisfy the additional requirements of the bounty. – JohnReed May 28 '12 at 17:06
  • Sorry if it's rude, but does this add anything more compared to the Herbert's answer? – yo' May 28 '12 at 17:59
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    Your question is legitimate. In terms of features, it does not add anything that I can think of. It is merely a slightly different way of addressing the original question by using the nonfloat package. I only added this answer for the sake of completeness. It may have worked better as an addendum to Herbert's answer but I didn't feel comfortable modifying it. – JohnReed May 28 '12 at 18:51
  • My apologies, I just wasn't sure. It is probably not wrong to provide an alternative, even though I think that caption package works great. – yo' May 28 '12 at 19:03