scale

plural scales

1. obsoleteA ladder; a series of steps; a means of ascending.
2. An ordered, usually numerical sequence used for measurement; means of assigning a magnitude.

   Please rate your experience on a scale from 1 to 10.

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   The magnitude of an earthquake is measured on the open-ended Richter scale.

3. Size; scope.

   There are some who question the scale of our ambitions.

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   We live our lives in three dimensions for our threescore and ten allotted years. Yet every branch of contemporary science, from statistics to cosmology, alludes to processes that operate on scales outside of human experience: the millisecond and the nanometer, the eon and the light-year.

   2012 January 28, Robert L. Dorit, “Rereading Darwin”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 1, archived from the original on 14 Nov 2012, page 23

4. The ratio of depicted distance to actual distance.

   This map uses a scale of 1:10.

5. A line or bar associated with a drawing, used to indicate measurement when the image has been magnified or reduced.

   Even though precision can be carried to an extreme, the scales which now are drawn in (and usually connected to an appropriate figure by an arrow) will allow derivation of meaningful measurements.

   1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page ix

6. entertainmentA series of notes spanning an octave, tritave, or pseudo-octave, used to make melodies.
7. A mathematical base for a numeral system; radix.

   the decimal scale, the binary scale

8. Gradation; succession of ascending and descending steps and degrees; progressive series; scheme of comparative rank or order.

   There is a certain scale of duties […] which for want of studying in right order, all the world is in confusion.

   1643, J[ohn] M[ilton], The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce: […], London: […] T[homas] P[aine] and M[atthew] S[immons] […], →OCLC

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   City's players and supporters travelled from one end of the emotional scale to the other in those vital seconds, providing a truly remarkable piece of football theatre and the most dramatic conclusion to a season in Premier League history.

   2012 May 13, Phil McNulty, “Man City 3-2 QPR”, in BBC Sport

9. A standard amount of money to be paid for a service, for example union-negotiated amounts received by a performer or writer; similar to wage scale or pay grade.

   Sally wasn't the star of the show, so she was glad to be paid scale.

present singular third person scales · participle present scaling · participle past scaled · past scaled

1. transitiveTo change the size of something whilst maintaining proportion; especially to change a process in order to produce much larger amounts of the final product.

   We should scale that up by a factor of 10.

2. transitiveTo climb to the top of.

   Hilary and Norgay were the first known to have scaled Everest.

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   At last I came to the great barrier-cliffs; and after three days of mad effort—of maniacal effort—I scaled them. I built crude ladders; I wedged sticks in narrow fissures; I chopped toe-holds and finger-holds with my long knife; but at last I scaled them. Near the summit I came upon a huge cavern.

   1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp., →OCLC; republished as chapter IX, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927, →OCLC

   A solitary rock is always attractive. All right-minded people feel an overwhelming desire to scale and sit upon it.

   1932, Dorothy L Sayers, chapter 1, in Have his Carcase

   The dead leap at the throat, destroy The meaning of the day; dark forms Have scaled your walls, and spies betray Old secrets to amorphous swarms.

   1941, Theodore Roethke, “Feud”, in Open House, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A[braham] Knopf, →OCLC; republished in The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke, London: Faber and Faber […], 1968, →OCLC, page 4

3. intransitivebusinessTo tolerate significant increases in throughput or other potentially limiting factors.

   That architecture won't scale to real-world environments.

4. computing or systems engineeringTo handle heavily increasing loads without breaking down.

   We started using the term “scaling” in place of “growing” around the late 1990s to early 2000s, primarily due to the rise of venture-backed startups in Silicon Valley. The term migrated from tech/infrastructure (“can this system scale?”) to startups (“can this business scale?”)

   May 12, 2025, Sarah Levinger, Post of "X" (formerly "Twitter")

5. marketing and venture management; coordinate term to "grow"; marketing and venture management; coordinate term to "grow"businessTo increase revenues exponentially without proportional increases in costs.

   Being able to move swiftly, try new things is critical in startups, so there shouldn't be friction upstream, but you need to make sure you have good process to purge things that don't scale with the rest.

   2024, Alexandre Mathieu, Post on "Linked in"

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   We started using the term “scaling” in place of “growing” around the late 1990s to early 2000s, primarily due to the rise of venture-backed startups in Silicon Valley. [...] VCs needed a way to describe businesses that could grow exponentially without adding proportional headcount or expense. So scalability became the holy grail. The term migrated from tech/infrastructure (“can this system scale?”) to startups (“can this business scale?”) and now everyone from lifestyle brands to DTC businesses use it as a universal term for "make business go big." (By the mid-2010s, “scale” was in every pitch deck and founder tweet, even if what they really meant was: “We’re trying to 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸, but we want to sound smarter so we're using the term "scale".”) This change in language actually had a HUGE effect on the minds of the people who were operating businesses across the globe.

   May 12, 2025, Sarah Levinger, Post of "X" (formerly "Twitter")

6. transitiveTo weigh, measure or grade according to a scale or system.

   Scaling his present bearing with his past.

   c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]

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   The kitchen-dining-buffet car scales 49.2 tons.

   1962 July, G. Freeman Allen, “The New "Rheingold"”, in Modern Railways, page 25

7. transitivebusinessTo take measurements from (an engineering drawing), treating them as (or as if) reliable dimensional instructions.

   Every single drawing in the specification has a warning in its title block which reads, "Do not scale this drawing."

plural scales

1. countableuncountablePart of an overlapping arrangement of many small, flat and hard pieces of keratin covering the skin of an animal, particularly a fish or reptile.

   Fish that, with their fins and shining scales, / Glide under the green wave.

   1667, John Milton, “Book VII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC

2. countableuncountableA small piece of pigmented chitin, many of which coat the wings of a butterfly or moth to give them their color.
3. countableuncountableA flake of skin of an animal afflicted with dermatitis.
4. countableuncountablePart of an overlapping arrangement of many small, flat and hard protective layers forming a pinecone that flare when mature to release pine nut seeds.
5. uncountableThe flaky material sloughed off heated metal.
6. countableuncountableScale mail (as opposed to chain mail).
7. uncountableLimescale.
8. countableuncountableA scale insect.
9. countableuncountableThe thin metallic side plate of the handle of a pocketknife.
10. USuncountableAn infestation of scale insects on a plant; commonly thought of as, or mistaken for, a disease.

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    Although of no effect so far as the course of the small outbreak at Nacaugai is concerned it is necessary to add here that the prompt destruction of kavika trees over much of the neighbouring land on Nagasau estate was in all probability an important measure of control and responsible for the freedom from scale of Nagasau estate at the time when Mua was badly attacked.

    1935 March 28, T[homas] H. C. Taylor, “The Campaign against Aspidiotus destructor, Sign., in Fiji”, in Bulletin of Entomological Research, volume 26, Imperial Institute of Entomology, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 96

present singular third person scales · participle present scaling · participle past scaled · past scaled

1. transitiveTo remove the scales of.

   Please scale that fish for dinner.

   Synonyms: descale

2. intransitiveTo become scaly; to produce or develop scales.

   The dry weather is making my skin scale.

3. transitiveTo take off in thin layers or scales, as tartar from the teeth; to pare off, as a surface.

   1684-1690, Thomas Burnet, Sacred Theory of the Earth if all the mountains and hills were scaled, and the earth made even

4. intransitiveTo separate and come off in thin layers or laminae.

   Some sandstone scales by exposure.

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   Those that cast their shell are the lobster and crab; the old skins are found, but the old shells never; so it is likely that they scale off.

   1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC

5. ScotlandUKdialectalTo scatter; to spread.
6. transitiveTo clean, as the inside of a cannon, by the explosion of a small quantity of powder.

   cannons […]caused to be scaled and loaded

   1816, Jedadiah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for William Blackwood, […]; London: John Murray, […], →OCLC

plural scales

1. A device to measure mass or weight.

   After the long, lazy winter I was afraid to get on the scale.

   Synonyms: scales

2. Either of the pans, trays, or dishes of a balance or scales.