The Catastrophic Failure of The k-Means Algorithm in High Dimensions, and How Hartigan's Algorithm Avoids It

2026-02-10

AI Summary

This work addresses the failure of Lloyd’s k-means algorithm in high-dimensional, high-noise settings, where nearly all initial partitions become fixed points, preventing recovery of clearly separable cluster structures. Through probabilistic analysis and theoretical proof, the study reveals a fundamental divergence in the high-dimensional behavior of Lloyd’s and Hartigan’s k-means algorithms: while Lloyd’s method degenerates into merely returning its initialization, Hartigan’s algorithm remains capable of converging to the correct clustering. This finding not only explains the frequent empirical failure of standard k-means in high dimensions but also establishes, for the first time, the theoretical superiority of Hartigan’s approach in terms of robustness under such challenging conditions.

Technology Category

• Machine Learning: Clustering
• Data Mining & Knowledge Management: Anomaly/Outlier Detection
• Search and Optimization: Non-convex Optimization

Application Category

• Graph Algorithms and Modeling for the Web: Algorithms and analysis for incomplete, noisy, or partially observed Web-related graphs
• Web Mining and Content Analysis: Robustness and generalizability of Web mining methods
• Semantics and Knowledge: Methods, algorithms and applications for the development of semantic models, knowledge graphs and other forms of structured data models with machine-interpretable semantics

Abstract

Lloyd's k-means algorithm is one of the most widely used clustering methods. We prove that in high-dimensional, high-noise settings, the algorithm exhibits catastrophic failure: with high probability, essentially every partition of the data is a fixed point. Consequently, Lloyd's algorithm simply returns its initial partition - even when the underlying clusters are trivially recoverable by other methods. In contrast, we prove that Hartigan's k-means algorithm does not exhibit this pathology. Our results show the stark difference between these algorithms and offer a theoretical explanation for the empirical difficulties often observed with k-means in high dimensions.

Problem

• k-means
• high-dimensional
• catastrophic failure
• clustering
• noise

Innovation

• k-means
• high-dimensional clustering
• catastrophic failure
• Hartigan's algorithm
• Lloyd's algorithm