The WRW model serves the geoscientists’ community as a global language dedicated to deliver a better insight into the seismic reflection experiment. In today’s numerical modeling, wave equation-based techniques such as implemented in the WRW model are used more and more, while it becomes clear that ray tracing methods do not have the required accuracy. The reflectivity matrix R is undoubtedly one of the most essential parts of the WRW model since it contains the angle dependent reflectivity information of the subsurface structures. It is this information that is to be retrieved from the seismic experiment. This paper provides insight in the formation process of this matrix. Different properties of the reflectivity matrix are investigated through the numerical modeling of three different cases. Moreover, the accuracy of the WRW approach is compared to that of ray tracing. The numerical results highlight the superiority of the WRW approach, i.e., the wave theory based approach, particularly in the case of a laterally variant reflector.