# Standard deviation problem

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/standard-deviation-problem/197174>\
**Category:** Kibana\
**Created:** [August 28, 2019, 4:38pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/standard-deviation-problem/197174 "2019-08-28T16:38:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Alan\_Home](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/alan_home/32/45644_2.png) [@Alan\_Home](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Alan_Home)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2019, 4:38pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/standard-deviation-problem/197174/1 "2019-08-28T16:38:56Z")

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I was trying to find something to replace Sumologic's Outlier detection. I thought Standard Deviation might be the answer, but it doesn't look like it's doing what I would expect.

I am trying to find if something has a longer than usual execution time. I would expect to see my values be somewhat near the standard deviation, but instead it's just a line in the center. Is there a better thing I should be using for outlier detection?

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/8/7/872dce89e649c1488bb3b082c10fef06ce469fab.png)

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**Author:** ![wylie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/wylie/32/81794_2.png) [@wylie](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/wylie)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2019, 5:49pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/standard-deviation-problem/197174/2 "2019-08-28T17:49:02Z")

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If I understand correctly, the kind of outlier detection you are used to is available with the [Machine Learning features](https://www.elastic.co/what-is/elastic-stack-machine-learning) in one of our paid plans.

Another way of dealing with this is to use a moving average, which is somewhat similar to what the other features are doing. Using a moving average I can see spikes:

 ![02](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/2/0/2052ac3fd9d4da855ca2ea21bd22f82f0b4a8168.png)

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**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [September 25, 2019, 5:49pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/standard-deviation-problem/197174/3 "2019-09-25T17:49:10Z")

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