Determining superconvergence points for L2−1σ scheme of variable‐exponent subdiffusion and error estimate

Abstract We develop a numerical scheme for subdiffusion of variable exponent by combining the temporal discretization with finite element spatial approximation. In existing works, determining the superconvergence points requires solving a nonlinear equation related to the variable exponent at each time step. This work relaxes the selection criterion of superconvergence points without affecting the numerical accuracy, which may reduce the cost of determining superconvergence points. To handle the initial singularity of the solution, we employ a graded temporal mesh. Then, we prove the stability and error estimates with a convergence rate for the scheme of variable‐exponent subdiffusion. Numerical results are performed to substantiate the theoretical findings.