Single Malt Scotch is whisky made in Scotland using a pot still distillation process at a single distillery, with malted barley as the only grain ingredient. As with any Scotch whisky, a Single Malt Scotch must be distilled in Scotland and matured in oak casks in Scotland for at least three years (most single malts are matured longer).

Until the Scotch Whisky Regulations 2009 (SWR 2009), the word "blended" only appeared (in the context of Scotch whisky) on bottles of whisky that contained a mixture of both barley and non-barley grain whisky, but this is no longer the case. When reading a label it is important to distinguish between "Blended Scotch Whisky" and "Blended Malt Scotch Whisky". Under the terminology established by the SWR 2009, a "Blended Malt Scotch Whisky" is a mixture of Single Malt Scotch Whiskies, not a mixture of malted barley whisky and non-barley whisky. The term "blended malt" was previously called a "vatted malt" under the prior labelling conventions.

All single malt Scotch goes through a similar batch production process, as outlined below. At bottling time various batches are mixed (or vatted) together to achieve consistent flavour from one bottling run to the next. Even so, some variation does occur (both intentionally and otherwise), and some distilleries may produce more consistent expressions than others. Distillers may choose to change expressions in some way to attract more buyers or a different kind of buyer, and may even choose to include batch-to-batch variation as a feature of their marketing strategy, as was done by Edradour in 2002 when the distillery was too small to maintain batch consistency.

Single malt whisky is a whisky made at one particular distillery from a mash that uses one particular malted grain, which is ordinarily barley.

Single malts are typically associated with Scotland, though they are also produced in various other countries. Under the Scotch Whisky Regulations, a "Single Malt Scotch Whisky" must be made exclusively from malted barley (although the addition of E150A caramel colouring is allowed), must be distilled using a pot still, and must be aged for at least three years in oak casks of a capacity not exceeding 700 litres. These constraints may not apply to whisky marketed as single malt that is produced elsewhere. For example, there is no definition of the term single malt in the law of the United States, and some American whisky advertised as single malt is produced from malted rye rather than malted barley.

All single malt goes through a similar batch production process, as outlined below. There are several types of Single Malts available from the distilleries including Single Barrel Single Malts which are the product of a single batch that was stored for 3+ years in a single oak barrel. These single barrel variants afford the opportunity for the consumer to see the influence of different types of storage on the same whisky (e.g., first use bourbon barrels, port pipes, etc.). The more common form of Single Malt is a marrying at bottling time of various batches that are mixed or vatted to achieve consistent flavours from one bottling run to the next.