In quantum physics, which interpretation is associated especially with Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg?

In quantum physics, the interpretation associated especially with Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg is the Copenhagen interpretation.

The Copenhagen interpretation developed during the 1920s as physicists built quantum mechanics. It emphasizes that a quantum system is described by a wave function and that measurement outcomes are probabilistic. It also gives a prominent role to the distinction between a quantum system and the classical apparatus used to record a result.

The name does not identify one perfectly standardized doctrine. Bohr and Heisenberg differed on some philosophical details, and later writers used “Copenhagen interpretation” as a broad label for related views. Complementarity, Bohr’s idea that different experimental arrangements reveal mutually exclusive but jointly necessary aspects, is strongly associated with it.

Other interpretations offer different accounts of measurement or reality. Many-worlds retains unitary evolution and branches into outcomes, while pilot-wave theory adds definite particle positions guided by a wave. These alternatives should not be treated as synonyms for the Copenhagen view.