an area in which something acts or operates or has power or control: "the range of a supersonic jet"
"a piano has a greater range than the human voice"
"the ambit of municipal legislation"
"within the compass of this article"
"within the scope of an investigation"
"outside the reach of the law"
"in the political orbit of a world power"
the state of the environment in which a situation exists
"you can't do that in a university setting"
electronic equipment that provides visual images of varying electrical quantities
"The technician connected an oscilloscope to the circuit board to visualize the fluctuating voltage spikes causing the system crash."
The breadth, depth or reach of a subject; a domain.
"The old hunter tied a fresh scope of twigs to his belt before setting off into the dense forest."
A bundle, as of twigs.
In plain English: Scope is the range of things that a project, topic, or search covers.
"The new software update expanded the scope of our project to include mobile devices."
To perform a cursory investigation of; scope out.
"Before finalizing the budget, the manager scoped out all potential expenses to ensure we didn't miss any hidden costs."
In plain English: To scope something means to look at it carefully from start to finish to see what is included or how big it is.
"The teacher asked each student to scope out the park for interesting plants before class."
Usage: Use scope as an informal verb to mean quickly investigating or examining something, often followed by the preposition "out." This term is best reserved for casual contexts rather than formal writing where words like "survey" or "assess" are preferred.
The word scope comes from the Italian scopo, meaning "purpose," which was borrowed from Latin scopus for "target." It ultimately traces back to Ancient Greek scopós, derived from a root associated with looking or observing.