Scottsdale is a city in eastern Maricopa County, Arizona, United States, and is part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. Named Scottsdale in 1894 after its founder Winfield Scott, a retired U.S. Army chaplain, the city was incorporated in 1951 with a population of 2,000. At the 2020 census, the population was 241,361, which had grown from 217,385 in 2010. Its slogan is "The West's Most Western Town". Over the past two decades, it has been one of the fastest growing cities and housing markets in the United States.

Scottsdale is 31 miles (50 km) from its northern to southernmost edge, and covers 184.5 square miles (478 km²). The city is bordered by the city of Phoenix to the west, Tonto National Forest to the north, the McDowell Mountains to the east, and the Salt River to the south.

Scottsdale was originally an Akimel O'odham village known as Vaṣai S-vaṣonĭ, meaning 'rotting hay'. Some Akimel O'odham remain there today. Until the late 1960s, there was a still-occupied traditional dwelling on the southeast corner of Indian Bend Road and Hayden Road. The Akimel O'odham who live in Scottsdale today reside in modern houses, not traditional dwellings. Many Akimel O'odham and Maricopa people live in the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, which borders Scottsdale to the south and east.

In the early to mid-1880s, U.S. Army Chaplain Winfield Scott visited the Salt River Valley and was impressed with it and its potential for agriculture. Returning in 1888 with his wife, Helen, he purchased 640 acres (260 ha) where historic Old Town is now, for $3.50 an acre ($92 as of 2015) . Another landowner in the Southern part of town, Albert G. Utley, filed plans with Maricopa County for a city named "Orangedale", using Scott's Field as a border. When the newspaper, then called the Arizona Republican, published an article about the plan, they erroneously called the town "Scottsdale". The article drew some publicity for the town, and ultimately this convinced Utley to change his filing and officially name the town "Scottsdale".

In 1896, the Scottsdale Public School system was established, and opened the first schoolhouse, which was followed by the opening of the first general store by J. L. Davis, which also housed the first post office for Scottsdale in 1897. In the early 1900s the community supported an artists and writers culture, culminating in the opening of the region's first resort in 1909, the Ingleside Inn, just south of the Arizona Canal and west of the Crosscut Canal (Indian School Road at about 64th Street) in what is today Scottsdale. Also in 1909, Cavalliere's Blacksmith Shop opened in downtown Scottsdale, and the original schoolhouse was replaced by the much more expansive Little Red Schoolhouse, which stands to this day. While not in its original building, Cavalliere's has been in continuous operation since that time.

In 1912, both the Phoenix Street Railway Company and a competitor, the Salt River Valley Electric Railway Company, proposed building streetcar lines to Scottsdale, but due to an economic downturn, neither was built. Between 1908 and 1933, due to the construction of the Granite Reef and Roosevelt dams (in 1908 and 1911, respectively), Scottsdale's population experienced a boom, growing steadily during those years. It became a small market town providing services for families involved in the agricultural industry.

During the First World War, Scottsdale and its environs supported a large cotton farming industry, due to the creation of Long Staple Egyptian Cotton, developed by the US Department of Agriculture. Cotton is still grown in southern Arizona, but Scottsdale's cotton boom ended with the loss of government contracts at the end of the war.

In 1920, a second resort was opened on 12 acres (4.9 ha) of property owned by the artist Jessie Benton Evans. Called the Jokake Inn, meaning "mud house", the structure still stands on the grounds of the Phoenician Resort.