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A bimodal distribution is a data distribution with a range of values near two individual values or two intervals, separating the data into two clusters. This causes the histogram of the data to have two peaks. The mean and the median of a bimodal distribution are near the center of the distribution.
The given distribution indicates that the sampling was likely made from two different populations. The term bimodal refers to the peaks of the distribution, which differs from the mode when intervals are used to make the data display. It is worth mentioning that a bimodal distribution whose bars are about the same height on each side of the peaks is also symmetric.
Consider a histogram that shows the attendance per hour at a local restaurant.
The peaks represent typical lunch and dinner hours. Since the histogram has two distinct peaks, it has a bimodal distribution. Traffic patterns, heights, and test scores are other examples that can show bimodal distribution. Although histograms are mainly used to show bimodality, other representations such as dot plots and leaf plots can also show bimodality.