The icp.xyz feature helps bridge the traditional DNS system and the Internet Computer Name Service, .icp is not a top-level domain so you cannot really type in “https://icns.icp” in your browser and access the ICNS website, but with the .xyz feature, it can be solved. Just attach .xyz to the end of the ICNS name, and type in “https://icns.icp.xyz” in the browser, it’ll take you to the https://icns.id website.
This feature can also help solve a specific problem on the IC, the Internet Computer is a native full-stack Web3 platform, which means you can deploy both backend logic and frontend interface to canisters on the IC. For frontend on the IC, it usually comes with a long and unfriendly URL like this: https://xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx.ic0.app, it is hard to remember and unfriendly for normal users, now with ICNS, all you need is an ICNS name to solve this.
There is a “Host” record setting area in the detail page of each ICNS name, you can set the destination to your frontend canister id or any URL you want, then everyone will be able to access the destination with https://<YOUR-ICNS-NAME>.icp.xyz, now you can get rid of the long and unfriendly URL.
The .xyz feature is only the first use case of ICNS to showcase the ability of ICNS, there will be more use cases coming in the near future, enriching the utility and ecosystem of ICNS, the ultimate goal is to build a Web3 ecosystem around ICNS.