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If the longest and shortest wavelengths that JWST can focus are 28.3 and 0.6 microns respectively, then it has a bandwidth (max/min) of a factor of about 47.

That's a lot, and of course it needs several different instruments for different wavelength ranges to make use of all of that.

But let's only talk about the entire system as "the telescope".

Is this the widest range?

For example if it were radio this might be 21 GHz to 1 THz or 10 meters to 20 centimeters.

The hard part about answering this question is the definition of "telescope". I suppose one could answer based on traditional instruments using reflection or refraction, and another might be anything that can resolve direction (e.g. IceCube Neutrino Observatory or one or other of the two Square Kilometer Arrays (Africa or Australia)

So answers can cite a winner for each definition if they like and resolve in each case if JWST has the largest bandwidth of any telescope.

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No, for your so-called “non-traditional” definition. The Large Area Telescope (note the name 😏) on board of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope alone has an energy range from 20 MeV to 300 GeV, a factor of 15000. If you also count the Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (8 keV to 30 MeV) it is nearly forty million.

I think this is a large range for gamma-ray telescopes but others are comparable. See for example this figure: The e-ASTROGAM mission (exploring the extreme Universe with gamma rays in the MeV-GeV range) The e-ASTROGAM mission (exploring the extreme Universe with gamma rays in the MeV-GeV range) by Alessandro De Angelis et al. is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

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  • $\begingroup$ I was going to mention Swift, but this wins. $\endgroup$
    – James K
    Commented Oct 28, 2022 at 6:32
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    $\begingroup$ @JamesK does Swift work for the "traditional" telescope (using refraction or reflection)? $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Commented Oct 28, 2022 at 9:34
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    $\begingroup$ It has a traditional telescope, but it also has a (soft) gamma-ray detector. You could well argue that these are two separate telescopes that happen to be on the same spacecraft. $\endgroup$
    – James K
    Commented Oct 28, 2022 at 9:47
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    $\begingroup$ @JamesK Oh I see ...Swift...is a NASA three-telescope space observatory... $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Commented Oct 28, 2022 at 19:49

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