OPC UA allows information from many different sources to be combined into a single coherent AddressSpace. Namespaces are used to make this possible by eliminating naming and ID conflicts between information from different sources. Namespaces in OPC UA have a globally unique 0:String called a NamespaceUri, and a locally unique integer called a NamespaceIndex. The NamespaceIndex is only unique within the context of a Session between an OPC UA Client and an OPC UA Server. The Services defined for OPC UA use the NamespaceIndex to specify the Namespace for qualified values.

There are two types of values in OPC UA that are qualified with Namespaces: NodeIds and QualifiedNames. NodeIds are globally unique identifiers for Nodes. This means the same Node with the same NodeId can appear in many Servers. This, in turn, means Clients can have built in knowledge of some Nodes. OPC UA Information Models generally define globally unique NodeIds for the TypeDefinitions defined by the Information Model.

QualifiedNames are non-localized names qualified with a Namespace. They are used for the BrowseNames of Nodes and allow the same names to be used by different information models without conflict. TypeDefinitions are not allowed to have children with duplicate BrowseNames; however, instances do not have that restriction.