分散共分散行列
は、ベクトル X の i 番目の要素の期待値である。すなわち、Σ は次のような行列である。
Σ = [ E [ ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ] E [ ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ] ⋯ E [ ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ( X n − μ n ) ] E [ ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ] E [ ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ] ⋯ E [ ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ( X n − μ n ) ] ⋮ ⋮ ⋱ ⋮ E [ ( X n − μ n ) ( X 1 − μ 1 ) ] E [ ( X n − μ n ) ( X 2 − μ 2 ) ] ⋯ E [ ( X n − μ n ) ( X n − μ n ) ] ] {\displaystyle \Sigma ={\begin{bmatrix}\mathrm {E} [(X_{1}-\mu _{1})(X_{1}-\mu _{1})]&\mathrm {E} [(X_{1}-\mu _{1})(X_{2}-\mu _{2})]&\cdots &\mathrm {E} [(X_{1}-\mu _{1})(X_{n}-\mu _{n})]\\\\\mathrm {E} [(X_{2}-\mu _{2})(X_{1}-\mu _{1})]&\mathrm {E} [(X_{2}-\mu _{2})(X_{2}-\mu _{2})]&\cdots &\mathrm {E} [(X_{2}-\mu _{2})(X_{n}-\mu _{n})]\\\\\vdots &\vdots &\ddots &\vdots \\\\\mathrm {E} [(X_{n}-\mu _{n})(X_{1}-\mu _{1})]&\mathrm {E} [(X_{n}-\mu _{n})(X_{2}-\mu _{2})]&\cdots &\mathrm {E} [(X_{n}-\mu _{n})(X_{n}-\mu _{n})]\end{bmatrix}}}
Σ = E ( X X ⊤ ) − μ μ ⊤ {\displaystyle \Sigma =\mathrm {E} (\mathbf {XX^{\top }} )-\mathbf {\mu } \mathbf {\mu ^{\top }} }
Σ {\displaystyle \Sigma } は、半正定値行列
var  ( A X + a ) = A var  ( X ) A ⊤ {\displaystyle \operatorname {var} (\mathbf {AX} +\mathbf {a} )=\mathbf {A} \,\operatorname {var} (\mathbf {X} )\,\mathbf {A^{\top }} }
cov  ( X , Y ) = cov  ( Y , X ) ⊤ {\displaystyle \operatorname {cov} (\mathbf {X} ,\mathbf {Y} )=\operatorname {cov} (\mathbf {Y} ,\mathbf {X} )^{\top }}