noun · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Pronunciation
Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.
UK:/kəʊˈvɛː.ɹi.əns/
US:/koʊˈvæɹ.i.əns/without the Mary–marry–merry merger
/ˈkoʊˈvɛɹ.i.əns/US, Mary–marry–merry merger
ConnecticutRecorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
Australian:/kəʉˈveː.ɹi.əns/
CMU ARPABET:K OW2 V AA1 R IY2 AH0 N S
Digits mark lexical stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.
1
noun
Meaning 1
A statistical measure defined as scriptstyle operatorname Cov(X,Y)= operatorname E((X-μ)(Y-ν)) given two real-valued random variables X and Y, with expected values scriptstyle E(X),=,μ and scriptstyle E(Y),=,ν.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: countable, uncountable
Topics: mathematics, sciences, statistics
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
2
noun
Meaning 2
The conversion of data types from wider to narrower in certain situations.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: countable, uncountable
Qualifier: object-oriented programming
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
3
noun
Meaning 3
(statistics) the mean value of the product of the deviations of two variates from their respective means
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: variance
History
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *ḱe? Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm Proto-Italic *kom Proto-Italic *kom- Latin con- Latin co-der. English co- English variance English covariance From co- + variance.
Across languages
Translations
34 source translations are retained for this English entry.