#jsDisabledContent { display:none; } My Account |  Register |  Help

# Minkowski distance

Article Id: WHEBN0020326689
Reproduction Date:

 Title: Minkowski distance Author: World Heritage Encyclopedia Language: English Subject: Collection: Publisher: World Heritage Encyclopedia Publication Date:

### Minkowski distance

The Minkowski distance is a metric on Euclidean space which can be considered as a generalization of both the Euclidean distance and the Manhattan distance.

## Definition

The Minkowski distance of order p between two points

P=(x_1,x_2,\ldots,x_n)\text{ and }Q=(y_1,y_2,\ldots,y_n) \in \mathbb{R}^n

is defined as:

\left(\sum_{i=1}^n |x_i-y_i|^p\right)^{1/p}

For p\geq1, the Minkowski distance is a metric as a result of the Minkowski inequality. When p<1, the distance between (0,0) and (1,1) is 2^{1/p}>2, but the point (0,1) is at a distance 1 from both of these points. Since this violates the triangle inequality, for p<1 it is not a metric.

Minkowski distance is typically used with p being 1 or 2. The latter is the Euclidean distance, while the former is sometimes known as the Manhattan distance. In the limiting case of p reaching infinity, we obtain the Chebyshev distance:

\lim_{p\to\infty}{\left(\sum_{i=1}^n |x_i-y_i|^p\right)^\frac{1}{p}} = \max_{i=1}^n |x_i-y_i|. \,

Similarly, for p reaching negative infinity, we have:

\lim_{p\to-\infty}{\left(\sum_{i=1}^n |x_i-y_i|^p\right)^\frac{1}{p}} = \min_{i=1}^n |x_i-y_i|. \,

The Minkowski distance can also be viewed as a multiple of the power mean of the component-wise differences between P and Q.

The following figure shows unit circles with various values of p: