The top-level domain (TLD) you’re referring to: XN—11B4C3D, is an internationalized domain name (IDN) TLD and is represented in ASCII compatible encoding (ACE) form. This form of encoding (Punycode) is used to convert Unicode strings into a form that can be supported by Domain Name System (DNS) which only supports ASCII characters.
In human-readable format, the TLD XN—11B4C3D represents भारत in Devanagari script, which translates to ‘Bharat’, the name for India in Hindi. As such, this is a country code top-level domain (ccTLD) specific to India.
Country code top-level domains (ccTLD) are used to represent specific geographic locations. For example, .us for the United States, .uk for the United Kingdom, .au for Australia, .jp for Japan, and so on. And in the case here, XN—11B4C3D for India.
The use of the Punycode version (XN—11B4C3D) instead of the actual Unicode characters भारत is due to the fact that the DNS doesn’t support non-ASCII characters. Punycode is a representation of Unicode characters that enables the use of a wide range of scripts (like, for instance, Devanagari script used to write Hindi, Marathi, and several other languages), but with ASCII characters only, ensuring compatibility with the existing DNS infrastructure.
The introduction of IDNs such as XN—11B4C3D has helped to close the digital divide, by allowing Internet users to access domain names in their own language. This, in turn, opens up the possibility for locals who are not as familiar with the Latin script to access the web and perform tasks such as creating websites or sending and receiving emails.
This specific ccTLD was delegated by Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) in 2014, as part of a fast-track process to enable nations and territories to apply for IDN ccTLDs. More information can be found on IANA’s website under the report of delegation for this ccTLD: https://www.iana.org/reports/2014/xn—11b4c3d-report-20140121.html.
Most ccTLDs are used or reserved for a country, sovereign state, or dependent territory as stated by the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country codes standard. However, many have been repurposed for other uses; examples include .tv (Tuvalu) for television and .me (Montenegro) for personal websites/blogs.
Further references:
- ZDNS (2016), ‘IDN World Report’, viewed 25 May 2021,
- Postel, J et al. (2003), ‘RFC3492 – Punycode: A Bootstring encoding of Unicode for Internationalized Domain Names in Applications (IDNA)’, IETF, viewed 25 May 2021,
- ICT Pulse (2015), ‘Closing the digital divide with Internationalised Domain Names’, viewed 25 May 2021,
