The invention relates to a dynamic-mode surface (12) scanning method in which a cantilever (10) provided with a probe (18) is non-positively coupled to the surface and is made to oscillate in a resonant fashion using positive feedback, wherein the resonant oscillation contains at least one higher harmonic whose frequency represents an integer multiple of the basic resonance frequency of the cantilever which is force-coupled to the surface. According to the invention, the amplitude or the phases of the at least one higher harmonic oscillation is determined as a control variable in order to regulate the distance between the probe (18) and the surface (14).