diff --git a/examples/api/power_norm.py b/examples/api/power_norm.py
index 491792c1a4b1..025841a51751 100644
--- a/examples/api/power_norm.py
+++ b/examples/api/power_norm.py
@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@
 axes[0, 0].hist2d(data[:, 0], data[:, 1], bins=100)
 
 for ax, gamma in zip(axes.flat[1:], gammas):
-    ax.set_title('Power law $(\gamma=%1.1f)$' % gamma)
+    ax.set_title(r'Power law $(\gamma=%1.1f)$' % gamma)
     ax.hist2d(data[:, 0], data[:, 1],
               bins=100, norm=mcolors.PowerNorm(gamma))
 
diff --git a/examples/recipes/fill_between_alpha.py b/examples/recipes/fill_between_alpha.py
index 3a53841b33d7..eb7d503ee54a 100644
--- a/examples/recipes/fill_between_alpha.py
+++ b/examples/recipes/fill_between_alpha.py
@@ -81,7 +81,7 @@
 ax.plot(t, mu2, lw=2, label='mean population 2', color='yellow')
 ax.fill_between(t, mu1+sigma1, mu1-sigma1, facecolor='blue', alpha=0.5)
 ax.fill_between(t, mu2+sigma2, mu2-sigma2, facecolor='yellow', alpha=0.5)
-ax.set_title('random walkers empirical $\mu$ and $\pm \sigma$ interval')
+ax.set_title(r'random walkers empirical $\mu$ and $\pm \sigma$ interval')
 ax.legend(loc='upper left')
 ax.set_xlabel('num steps')
 ax.set_ylabel('position')
diff --git a/examples/recipes/placing_text_boxes.py b/examples/recipes/placing_text_boxes.py
index 882839c502b7..7ec033df6e1a 100644
--- a/examples/recipes/placing_text_boxes.py
+++ b/examples/recipes/placing_text_boxes.py
@@ -20,7 +20,10 @@
 mu = x.mean()
 median = np.median(x)
 sigma = x.std()
-textstr = '$\mu=%.2f$\n$\mathrm{median}=%.2f$\n$\sigma=%.2f$' % (mu, median, sigma)
+textstr = '\n'.join((
+    r'$\mu=%.2f$' % (mu, ),
+    r'$\mathrm{median}=%.2f$' % (median, ),
+    r'$\sigma=%.2f$' % (sigma, )))
 
 ax.hist(x, 50)
 # these are matplotlib.patch.Patch properties
diff --git a/examples/shapes_and_collections/path_patch.py b/examples/shapes_and_collections/path_patch.py
index dc07c2a5b004..aea628e6a835 100644
--- a/examples/shapes_and_collections/path_patch.py
+++ b/examples/shapes_and_collections/path_patch.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 ================
 PathPatch object
 ================
diff --git a/examples/text_labels_and_annotations/arrow_demo.py b/examples/text_labels_and_annotations/arrow_demo.py
index 00d4a57f6fc0..49b07205d0c8 100644
--- a/examples/text_labels_and_annotations/arrow_demo.py
+++ b/examples/text_labels_and_annotations/arrow_demo.py
@@ -213,7 +213,7 @@ def draw_arrow(pair, alpha=alpha, ec=ec, labelcolor=labelcolor):
         coords = np.dot(orig_position, M) + [[x_pos, y_pos]]
         x, y = np.ravel(coords)
         orig_label = rate_labels[pair]
-        label = '$%s_{_{\mathrm{%s}}}$' % (orig_label[0], orig_label[1:])
+        label = r'$%s_{_{\mathrm{%s}}}$' % (orig_label[0], orig_label[1:])
 
         plt.text(x, y, label, size=label_text_size, ha='center', va='center',
                  color=labelcolor or fc)
diff --git a/examples/ticks_and_spines/spines_bounds.py b/examples/ticks_and_spines/spines_bounds.py
index fd66eb5612bd..be4f9935e281 100644
--- a/examples/ticks_and_spines/spines_bounds.py
+++ b/examples/ticks_and_spines/spines_bounds.py
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@
 # set ticks and tick labels
 ax.set_xlim((0, 2*np.pi))
 ax.set_xticks([0, np.pi, 2*np.pi])
-ax.set_xticklabels(['0', '$\pi$', '2$\pi$'])
+ax.set_xticklabels(['0', r'$\pi$', r'2$\pi$'])
 ax.set_ylim((-1.5, 1.5))
 ax.set_yticks([-1, 0, 1])
 
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py b/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
index ae8b9af0f41d..6959de8d518c 100644
--- a/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
+++ b/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
@@ -1844,7 +1844,7 @@ def acorr(self, x, **kwargs):
     @_preprocess_data(replace_names=["x", "y"], label_namer="y")
     def xcorr(self, x, y, normed=True, detrend=mlab.detrend_none,
               usevlines=True, maxlags=10, **kwargs):
-        """
+        r"""
         Plot the cross correlation between *x* and *y*.
 
         The correlation with lag k is defined as sum_n x[n+k] * conj(y[n]).
@@ -5595,7 +5595,7 @@ def _pcolorargs(funcname, *args, **kw):
     @_preprocess_data(label_namer=None)
     @docstring.dedent_interpd
     def pcolor(self, *args, **kwargs):
-        """
+        r"""
         Create a pseudocolor plot with a non-regular rectangular grid.
 
         Call signature::
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/sphinxext/plot_directive.py b/lib/matplotlib/sphinxext/plot_directive.py
index d7f03b881d9f..434bc50aee29 100644
--- a/lib/matplotlib/sphinxext/plot_directive.py
+++ b/lib/matplotlib/sphinxext/plot_directive.py
@@ -346,7 +346,7 @@ def remove_coding(text):
     r"""
     Remove the coding comment, which six.exec\_ doesn't like.
     """
-    sub_re = re.compile("^#\s*-\*-\s*coding:\s*.*-\*-$", flags=re.MULTILINE)
+    sub_re = re.compile(r"^#\s*-\*-\s*coding:\s*.*-\*-$", flags=re.MULTILINE)
     return sub_re.sub("", text)
 
 #------------------------------------------------------------------------------
diff --git a/setupext.py b/setupext.py
index d2ff239adaaf..93585262c88f 100644
--- a/setupext.py
+++ b/setupext.py
@@ -2051,7 +2051,7 @@ def check(self):
             output = check_output('latex -version', shell=True,
                                   stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
             line = output.splitlines()[0].decode()
-            pattern = '(3\.1\d+)|(MiKTeX \d+.\d+)'
+            pattern = r'(3\.1\d+)|(MiKTeX \d+.\d+)'
             match = re.search(pattern, line)
             return "version %s" % match.group(0)
         except (IndexError, ValueError, AttributeError, subprocess.CalledProcessError):
diff --git a/tests.py b/tests.py
index 88d3e2195343..9bc83c91c3cb 100755
--- a/tests.py
+++ b/tests.py
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@
         category=DeprecationWarning)
     warnings.filterwarnings(
         'default',
-        '.*inspect.getargspec\(\) is deprecated.*',
+        r'.*inspect.getargspec\(\) is deprecated.*',
         category=DeprecationWarning)
 
     from matplotlib import test
diff --git a/tutorials/text/annotations.py b/tutorials/text/annotations.py
index 5706e08cdc75..b9546582f089 100644
--- a/tutorials/text/annotations.py
+++ b/tutorials/text/annotations.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 Annotations
 ===========
 
diff --git a/tutorials/text/pgf.py b/tutorials/text/pgf.py
index 27415528e160..36056ca85460 100644
--- a/tutorials/text/pgf.py
+++ b/tutorials/text/pgf.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 *********************************
 Typesetting With XeLaTeX/LuaLaTeX
 *********************************
diff --git a/tutorials/text/usetex.py b/tutorials/text/usetex.py
index 00d7b8bf21e6..bcb558b3df3e 100644
--- a/tutorials/text/usetex.py
+++ b/tutorials/text/usetex.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 *************************
 Text rendering With LaTeX
 *************************
diff --git a/tutorials/toolkits/axes_grid.py b/tutorials/toolkits/axes_grid.py
index 7b4ad9f3eda1..71935015d480 100644
--- a/tutorials/toolkits/axes_grid.py
+++ b/tutorials/toolkits/axes_grid.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 ==============================
 Overview of axes_grid1 toolkit
 ==============================
diff --git a/tutorials/toolkits/axisartist.py b/tutorials/toolkits/axisartist.py
index 6807102f9550..bf9fb0e0c0d2 100644
--- a/tutorials/toolkits/axisartist.py
+++ b/tutorials/toolkits/axisartist.py
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-"""
+r"""
 ==============================
 Overview of axisartist toolkit
 ==============================
diff --git a/versioneer.py b/versioneer.py
index bef128c5dc55..aca3ce819433 100644
--- a/versioneer.py
+++ b/versioneer.py
@@ -469,7 +469,7 @@ def run_command(commands, args, cwd=None, verbose=False, hide_stderr=False):
             print("unable to run %s (error)" % dispcmd)
         return None
     return stdout
-LONG_VERSION_PY['git'] = '''
+LONG_VERSION_PY['git'] = r'''
 # This file helps to compute a version number in source trees obtained from
 # git-archive tarball (such as those provided by githubs download-from-tag
 # feature). Distribution tarballs (built by setup.py sdist) and build