How to avoid PyCharm console crash "WARNING: QApplication was not created in the main() thread" when plotting with matplotlib?

I sent this question to JetBrains: https://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/PY-36136

They couldn't find a solution yet, but the workaround they suggested is the following:

Disable Show plots in tool window in File | Settings | Tools | Python Scientific.

This worked for me, although it doesn't plot in the PyCharm window.

There several things you can try:

First, you can try to update the Qt. You may have some older version. Run

print(plt.get_backend())

to verify which backend you are using. If you are using Qt4, try Qt5 back end.

Next, update Qt5 to the latest version via

pip install --upgrade PyQt5

Also, you can try ditching Qt and switch to Tk back end: add

import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('TkAgg')

before importing pyplot