Annotation features are most useful within a fairly narrow range of map scales in which they are legible. It is often helpful to set a minimum and maximum scale within which annotation feature classes will be drawn. You can make this visible scale range a property of the annotation feature class itself or set it as a property of a layer that points to the annotation feature class. For large annotation feature classes and in multiuser environments, the former approach is best, as it is the most effective way to prevent large numbers of annotation features from being needlessly requested from the server.

To set the scale range for an annotation feature class, right-click the annotation feature class in ArcCatalog, click Properties, and click the Annotation Classes tab. You can set a separate scale range for each annotation class in the annotation feature class. Click the Scale Range button to set the minimum and maximum visible scales.

For this annotation feature class you might limit display of the annotation to map scales where the annotation is legible.

To do so, click the Don’t show layer when zoomed button, type “2500” in the Out beyond 1: box, and click OK.

The annotation will not be drawn when someone viewing it zooms out beyond 1:2500 scale.