ENS is the Ethereum Name Service. It swaps a long wallet address like 0xd8dA6BF26964aF9D7eEd9e03E53415D37aA96045 for something you can read and say out loud, like vitalik.eth. You register a name and point it at your wallet. Anyone who knows the name can then send you crypto or look up your profile without handling the full address.

Your name holds an ETH Address record that points at your wallet, and you can add addresses on other chains too, such as Bitcoin and Solana. To have apps show yourname.eth instead of your 0x address, make it your primary name, the name apps show for your wallet: see Set your primary name.

Your name also holds records: an avatar, social handles, wallet addresses, a decentralised website and any custom text you add. Apps that read ENS pick up this profile when you connect, so you don't build a new profile for each one. Some apps let you sign in with your wallet instead of a password (Sign-In with Ethereum); if your wallet has a primary name, that is the name they greet you by. See Edit your ENS profile.

Point yourname.eth at a website hosted on a decentralised network such as IPFS, Swarm or Arweave, by setting its content hash record. Your name and your site then both sit outside any one company's servers. See Add a decentralised website to your name.

Your name can have subnames, like pay.yourname.eth or alice.yourteam.eth. Each has its own records and can point at a different wallet. Communities give them to members as a shared identity; you can use them to label your own wallets. See Create a subname in ENS Explorer.

Search for the name you want at app.ens.domains and, if it is available, register it there. You pay per year in stablecoins (USDC), and the network fee (gas) is paid in USDC too. The name is then yours to manage: edit its records, transfer it, or renew it before it expires. See Register a .eth name and Pricing & Fees.

You register a name, and ENS keeps a public note of which wallet and which details that name points at. Any app can read that note, which is why people can send to your name instead of a long address, and why your profile follows you between apps. You can change your records at any time; the name stays the same even when the wallet behind it changes. Underneath, three contracts do the work. The registrar registers .eth names and takes the fee. The registry records who owns each name and which resolver it uses, and the resolver holds the name's records. When someone sends crypto to your name, their wallet asks the registry for the resolver, and the resolver answers with your address. For more words like these, see the Glossary. ENS also works with DNS names you already own, such as a .com: see What TLDs are supported?

ENS is a decentralised protocol governed by the ENS DAO, a community that votes on proposals. No single company owns or controls it. Names are held onchain as NFTs, and a name stays yours for as long as you keep it registered. See Official ENS websites, apps, and tools and The story of ENS.

ENSv2 is live on Ethereum. It rebuilds the protocol so that each name can have its own registry, for its subnames, with finer control over who can do what. A name on ENSv1 keeps working, and you can upgrade it to ENSv2 in the ENS App; a few wrapped names with certain fuses burnt can't upgrade.