What is MoSCoW Prioritization?
MoSCoW sorts requirements into four buckets: Must have (without these, the release fails or is illegal), Should have (important, painful to skip, but survivable), Could have (nice if room remains), and Won't have this time (explicitly out — the most honest bucket in the model).
Its power move is the "Won't" list: writing down what you're not doing prevents the quiet expectation that everything eventually ships. Guard the Must bucket fiercely — when 80% of items are "Must," you've prioritized nothing.
Worked example
An MVP banking app: Must — login, balance view, transfers, regulatory KYC. Should — spending categories. Could — dark mode. Won't (this release) — joint accounts, crypto. When the deadline tightens, the team cuts from the bottom up, and nobody has to renegotiate what "essential" meant.