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A telescope collects electromagnetic radiation from distant objects and forms an image or supplies a signal to a detector. An optical telescope can use lenses or mirrors; instruments for other wavelengths can require different collecting structures. Collection increases the detectable signal, while the aperture and wavelength constrain the angular resolution.

For an ideal unobscured circular aperture of diameter $D$, the Rayleigh criterion gives an angular scale $\theta \simeq 1.22\lambda /D$. Increasing the magnification of an already blurred image cannot recover angular detail lost through diffraction, optical aberrations or atmospheric seeing. This makes a double star a useful observing test: a larger apparent image is different from two genuinely resolved intensity peaks.^[ref]

For a diffraction-limited telescope, collecting area scales as $D^2$ while a native angular resolution element scales as $(\lambda /D{)}^2$. Counts from a smooth resolved source per native resolution element therefore do not increase with aperture, at fixed radiance, exposure and throughput. Counts in a fixed angular bin instead grow as $D^2$, and the photon-noise-limited signal-to-noise ratio grows as $D\sqrt{t}$. Conservation of etendue and cosmological surface-brightness dimming do not forbid this latter gain.

An author of a detailed technical treatment of the optics of telescopes. His exposition connects optical aberrations, diffraction and instrument geometry with the appearance of an image. Comparing ideal and imperfect optical systems helps readers judge how a proposed telescope design will concentrate light and what limits the sharpness of its image.^[ref]