Techniques for adaptive scanning with a laser scanner include obtaining range measurements at a coarse angular resolution and determining a range gate subset and a characteristic range. A fine angular resolution is based on the characteristic range and a target spatial resolution. If the fine angular resolution is finer than the coarse angular resolution, then a minimum vertical angle and maximum vertical angle is determined for a horizontal slice of the subset of angular width based on the first angular resolution. The scanning laser ranging system is then operated to obtain second range measurements at the second angular resolution in the slice between the minimum vertical angle and the maximum vertical angle. In some embodiments, the scanning is repeated for each horizontal slice in the range gate subset using a minimum vertical angle and maximum vertical angle for that slice.