ENS

ENS (Ethereum Name Service) is a naming system that maps human-readable names ending in .eth to Ethereum addresses and other data, much as DNS maps website names to server addresses. Instead of sharing a 42-character hexadecimal address, a user can register a name like alice.eth and receive funds sent to that name in any wallet that supports ENS.

Each ENS name is itself an NFT, owned and transferable like any other token, and registered for a chosen duration by paying an annual fee that depends on the name's length. The owner can point the name at an address, a website, an avatar image, and other profile records, and can also create subdomains such as pay.alice.eth. For example, sending ETH to vitalik.eth in a compatible wallet resolves automatically to the underlying address.

A common misconception is that ENS names are owned forever; registrations expire if not renewed, and lapsed names can be registered by someone else. Because names are transferable NFTs, short and desirable names trade on secondary markets. ENS matters beyond convenience: it reduces the risk of mistyped addresses and serves as a portable public identity across dApps that display .eth names in place of raw addresses.