What is "multi-tenancy"

Multitenancy refers to a software architecture principle in which a single instance of the software runs on a server, serving several client-organizations (tenants). Multitenancy contrasts with architectures of multiple instances where separate software instances (or hardware systems) operate on behalf of different client organizations. With a multi-tenant architecture, a software application is designed to virtually partition your data and settings, and each client organization works with a custom virtual application.

Commentators consider multitenancy an important feature of cloud computing.

Source: Wikipedia article in English