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Enhanced Capabilities in Entry-Level Oscilloscopes
Configure a Keysight Essential oscilloscope to meet your needs — where even the most affordable XR1-class integrates six instruments in one and provides auto-measurement capabilities. The XR3-class features a 14-bit ADC with four times the resolution and half the noise floor of other general-purpose oscilloscopes. It comes in benchtop and compact 1U rack-mountable formats, with the 1U supporting synchronized multi-scope measurements across hundreds of analog channels. Keysight Essential oscilloscopes feature automated test software for mask testing, fast Fourier transform (FFT), and protocol triggering and decoding, plus histograms and Bode plots. Choose one of our popular configurations or configure one specific to your application. Need help selecting? Check out the resources below.
6 instruments in 1
Keysight Essential oscilloscopes integrate an oscilloscope, wavegen, protocol analyzer, digital voltmeter, frequency counter, and frequency response analyzer in one instrument.
Serial bus analysis
Supports triggering and decoding on common serial buses like I2C, UART / RS232, SPI, CAN, and LIN, ensuring accurate signal analysis and efficient troubleshooting across multiple protocols.
Automated measurement
Preprogrammed features you need to capture key parameters like frequency, amplitude, and rise time, without needing to manually configure measurements.
Compact and portable
Compact, lightweight Essential oscilloscopes enable you to take your testing with you and move your measurements to wherever you need.
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Maximum bandwidth
70 MHz to 1 GHz
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Analog channels
2 to 4
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Digital channels
0 to 16
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Maximum sample rate
2 GSa/s to 5 GSa/s
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Maximum memory depth
1 Mpts to 100 Mpts
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Display size
3.12 inch to 10.1 inch
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ADC resolution
8 bits to 14 bits
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Brands included
1000 Series, 2000 Series, 3000 Series, HD3 Series, XR3 Series
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Multi-scope synchronization
Varies
New Essential XR3 oscilloscope
Scale from tens to hundreds of synchronized analog channels with up to 1 GHz bandwidth in a rack-mountable design:
- Increase rack density with four channels in a 1U form factor.
- Synchronize multiple oscilloscopes with a 10-MHz reference clock.
- Reveal millivolt-level ripple with a 14-bit ADC and low noise floor.
- Capture rare glitches with a 1.3M waveforms-per-second update rate.
See five quick demos of the XR3 in action during our 30-minute webinar.
Most Popular Configurations
XR1-class Oscilloscope, with built-in waveform generator
XR3-class Oscilloscope, mixed signal with built-in waveform generator
XR3-class Oscilloscope, 1U rack mountable with multi-scope synchronization
Explore Essential Oscilloscope Use Cases
Essential oscilloscopes support a wide range of measurements across various industries, discover them all.
Consumer Electronics
How to Debug Electronic Devices with High Accuracy
General Electronics
How to Verify Filter and Amplifier Response with FRA
Measure analog filter and amplifier frequency response with a built-in waveform generator.
General Electronics
How to Measure Power Rail Ripple
Learn how to keep measurement-induced distortion low.
General Electronics
How to Compare Low-, High-, and Band-Pass Filter Response
Compare how low-, high-, and band-pass circuits shape gain and phase across frequency.
Automotive
How to Find Intermittent Errors on Automotive Serial Buses
Use hardware-based decoding and segmented memory to find intermittent errors.
Services and support
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Get predictable, lease-based subscriptions and full lifecycle management solutions—so you reach your business goals faster.
Experience elevated service as a KeysightCare subscriber to get committed technical response and more.
Ensure your test system performs to specification and meets local and global standards.
Make measurements quickly with in-house, instructor-led training, and eLearning.
Download Keysight software or update your software to the newest version.
Frequently Asked Questions
Modern oscilloscopes include features like automated measurements, Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) analysis, and triggering options. These features enhance the oscilloscope's functionality, making it a powerful tool for a wide range of applications. Below are some details about these oscilloscope features:
Automated Measurements
Automatically measure various parameters of a waveform, such as frequency, amplitude, rise time, fall time, and more. This feature speeds up analysis of common parameters and reduces the potential for human error in manual measurements.
Fast Fourier Transform (FFT)
FFT analysis allows the oscilloscope to convert time-domain signals into their frequency-domain components. This is particularly useful for identifying the frequency content of a signal, diagnosing issues like noise and harmonics, and performing spectral analysis.
Triggering Options
Triggering allows users to capture specific events within a signal. Triggers can be set based on conditions like pulse width, logic patterns, runt pulses, and more. This helps in isolating and analyzing complex signal behaviors.
The waveform update rate of an oscilloscope refers to the frequency that it refreshes or captures new waveform data and displays it on the screen. A high waveform update rate is especially important when analyzing dynamic or rapidly changing signals like those from transient events, glitches, or intermittent signals. If the waveform update rate is not fast enough, the oscilloscope may fail to capture these signals, missing valuable information and leading to inaccurate analysis.
The waveform update rate is also important for real-time monitoring of signals in applications like embedded systems development with complex interactions between analog and digital components, power electronics and power supplies that have high-frequency switching and transient behavior, and consumer electronics to validate the performance of devices during development and production.
The analog-to-digital converter (ADC) is a critical component in an oscilloscope. It determines the oscilloscope’s accuracy, precision, and performance in capturing and analyzing signals. The number of bits that the ADC has, or bit depth, determines the oscilloscope’s vertical resolution, which depicts how small of a change in voltage can be accurately represented. The core function of the ADC is to sample an analog signal like a voltage waveform and convert it into a series of digital values that the oscilloscopes central processing unit (CPU) understands. The oscilloscope’s ADC samples the analog signal at discrete time intervals, converts them into digital samples, and then reconstructs a visual representation of the waveform on the display.
The resolution of the ADC or bit depth determines how precisely the oscilloscope can differentiate between different voltage levels in the signal. For example, an 8-bit ADC divides the signal's amplitude range into 256 levels, whereas a 14-bit ADC can represent a signal with 16,384 discrete voltage levels. This finer resolution is especially useful in high-precision applications like aerospace and defense radar, sonar, and telemetry systems, power electronic DC to DC converters and switch-mode power supplies, or medical applications like magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or computed tomography (CT) scans.
A 1U rack-mountable 1 GHz oscilloscope is used to capture, analyze, and debug electronic signals in automated test systems, validation labs, and production environments. Its compact rack-mounted design enables engineers to add oscilloscope measurements to space-constrained test setups while keeping instruments organized and accessible.
With 1 GHz bandwidth, these oscilloscopes are well suited for monitoring clock timing, power-electronics switching, serial communications, and transient events. They are used across applications such as aerospace and defense validation, pass / fail manufacturing test, high-energy physics research, and semiconductor test and debug.
Rack-mountable oscilloscopes are particularly useful when repeatable measurements, remote operation, or integration with other test equipment is required. They can help engineers identify signal-integrity issues, validate device performance, and support automated functional test, system-level validation, and long-term monitoring of electronic equipment.