Dynamic range
The span between the loudest signal a system can handle and the quietest one still audible above its noise.
The term has two meanings that are easily confused. The technical one is about equipment: from clipping level down to the noise floor. 16-bit audio has a theoretical 96 dB and 24-bit 144 dB — more than any converter actually delivers, with good designs topping out around 120 dB. The ear covers roughly the same, from the threshold of hearing to the threshold of pain.
The musical meaning is about the recording itself: the gap between its quietest and loudest passages. That has been shrinking for decades through compression and limiting, otherwise known as the loudness war. Fittingly, formats have never offered more room than in the years music chose to use less of it.