Menu
Home
People
Places
Arts
History
Plants & Animals
Science
Life & Culture
Technology
Reference.org
Elbow method (clustering)
open-in-new
<p>In <a href="/facts/Cluster_analysis/HUeDnWPt">cluster analysis</a>, the elbow method is a <a href="/facts/Heuristic/BcBEkv9c">heuristic</a> used in <a href="/facts/Determining_the_number_of_clusters_in_a_data_set/GQHnnBrw">determining the number of clusters in a data set</a>. The method consists of plotting the <a href="/facts/Explained_variation/06KljKzp">explained variation</a> as a function of the number of clusters and picking the <a href="/facts/Elbow_of_the_curve/ePon7nfv">elbow of the curve</a> as the number of clusters to use. The same method can be used to choose the number of parameters in other data-driven models, such as the number of <a href="/facts/Principal_component/pCbVTqdR">principal components</a> to describe a data set. </p><p>The method can be traced to speculation by <a href="/facts/Robert_L._Thorndike/6oJRRG6N">Robert L. Thorndike</a> in 1953. </p>