change row names in dataframe r code example

Example 1: r set column values as rownames in dataframe

# Basic syntax:
rownames(your_dataframe) <- your_dataframe[,1]
your_dataframe[,1] <- NULL

# Example usage:
# Say you have the following dataframe and want to set the values of 
# col1 as the rownames and then remove col1, here's how to do it
names	col1	col2	col3
1		A		1		5
2		B		2		4
3		C		3		3
4		D		4		2
5		E		5		1

rownames(your_dataframe) <- your_dataframe[,1]
your_dataframe[,1] <- NULL

# Which would produce:
names	col1	col2
A		1		5
B		2		4
C		3		3
D		4		2
E		5		1

Example 2: r change row names of a dataframe

# Basic syntax:
rownames(your_dataframe) <- new_names
# Note, the new_names has to be the same length as the dataframe

# Example usage:
# Say you want to set the rownames to be numbered 1-end:
rownames(your_dataframe) <- 1:nrow(your_dataframe)