A skyscraper is a tall, continuously habitable building of many storeys, usually designed for office and commercial use. There is no official definition or height above which a building may be classified as a skyscraper. One common feature is having a steel framework from which curtain walls are suspended, rather than load-bearing walls of conventional construction.

In context, a relatively small building may be considered a skyscraper if it protrudes well above its built environment and changes the overall skyline. The maximum height of structures has progressed historically with building methods and technologies. Also lacking an official definition, the term 'Supertall' has arisen for the current generation of exceptionally tall buildings.

The term "skyscraper" was first applied to buildings of steel framed construction of at least 10 storeys in the late 19th century, a result of public amazement at the tall buildings being built in major cities like Chicago, New York City, Detroit, and St. Louis. The first steel frame skyscraper was the Home Insurance Building (originally 10 storeys with a height of 42 m or 138 ft) in Chicago, Illinois in 1885. Some point to New York's seven-floor Equitable Life Assurance Building, built in 1870, as an early skyscraper for its innovative use of a kind of skeletal frame, but such designation depends largely on what factors are chosen. Even the scholars making the argument find it to be purely academic.