In probability theory and statistics, the Epanechnikov distribution, also known as the Epanechnikov kernel, is a continuous probability distribution that is defined on a finite interval.

It is named after V. A. Epanechnikov, who introduced it in 1969 in the context of kernel density estimation.

[1] A random variable has an Epanechnikov distribution if its probability density function is given by: where

yields a unit variance probability distribution.

The Epanechnikov distribution has applications in various fields, including: