It's been a year but I would recommend installing Anaconda Navigator which comes with a built in Matplotlib, so there's no need for any further installation.

I solved it using a virtual environment: you can install virtualenv for that with: ~> pip install virtualenv 1. Install python virtual environment in the folder you want to work: ~> cd /Your-Folder-directory ~> virtualenv venv 2. Activate the virtual environment: ~> ./venv/Scripts/activate #Windows only or ~> venv/bin/activate #on Mac and Linux 3. Install the modules you need to use in python: You can use: (venv)~> pip install matplotlib numpy pandas ,for axample 4. Install Jupyter Notebook: Same: (venv)~> pip install jupyter notebook 5. Open Jupyter notebook: (venv)~> jupyter notebook That should work now. PD: The version of python that goes in the virtual environment depend on the version installed in your system, if you have both versions, python2 and python3, you can select the one you want using ~> virtualenv -p venv if you want to now the python version: ~> python --version or ~> python3 --version also work with ~> python -V