A measure of the variability of a data set or random process. The variance describes how far values lie from the mean (the first moment of the distribution), and is used, along with the mean, and higher moments, to characterize a probability distribution. The Variance is defined as the expectation of (X-µ)^2 where X is value and µ is the expected value or mean. While the combination of the variance and the mean fully describe a normal distribution (gaussian) they are not sufficient to describe the strongly non-normal distribution for video poker. Nonetheless, variance is an important factor to consider and understand in many aspects of video poker. For video poker, typical values of the Variance range roughly from 15 (PKM) to 100 (DBDJ) and is in units of the bet squared.
See also: Standard Deviation, Expectation, Expected Value, PKM, DBDJ.