stat.MLSep 15, 2026

Sharp margin-based generalization bounds for realizable SVM

Authors: Steve HannekeAryeh Kontorovich

Abstract

Let the exact homogeneous hard-margin support vector machine be trained on mm independent observations from a Borel probability law on a real Hilbert space. We prove that, with score zero counted as an error, there is a universal numerical constant CC such that

\Pp(γm>0,\Risk(um)>Cm(Km+log1δ))δ.\Pp\left( γ_m>0,\quad \Risk(u_m)> \frac{C}{m} \left( K_m+\log\frac1δ \right) \right) \le δ.

Here γmγ_m is the empirical homogeneous margin, umu_m is the exact minimum-norm unit-margin separator, rmr_m is the largest training radius, and Km:=rm2\normum2=rm2/γm2K_m:=r_m^2\norm{u_m}^2=r_m^2/γ_m^2 on {γm>0}\{γ_m>0\}. The proof is driven by a deterministic deletion problem. Given vectors x1,,xnx_1,\ldots,x_n in the unit ball, delete a set BB of constraints and let uBu_B be the closest point to the origin that satisfies every retained unit-margin constraint. Suppose that \normuB2k\norm{u_B}^2\le k and that every deleted vector has nonpositive score under uBu_B. We prove that a family of such deletion sets of cardinality qq has size at most exp(8k+2q)\exp(8k+2q). The conceptual step is an exact identity obtained from the KKT representation of uBu_B. For a random deletion set, the identity converts the mean squared spread of the separators into a weighted sum of score deficits. It therefore forces a coordinate whose deletion status separates the two conditional means by a quantitatively large amount. Revealing that coordinate decreases the conditional separator variance enough to control the binary entropy of the split. An entropy induction gives the deletion count, and an exact factorial ghost-sample identity converts that count into the stated high-probability SVM bound.

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