What is a bounded context in domain-driven design?

A bounded context is a central concept in Domain-Driven Design (DDD) that defines the explicit boundary within which a particular domain model applies. Inside a bounded context, all terms, rules, and models have a precise, unambiguous meaning. For example, the word "Customer" might mean different things in a billing context (a payer with a credit card) versus a shipping context (a recipient with an address). Microservices naturally align with bounded contexts — each service owns its model, its database, and its language, preventing the muddy, inconsistent models that plague large shared databases. Bounded contexts are identified through a practice called Event Storming.