The inductively coupled plasma(ICP) etching of platinum with BCl$_3$/Cl$_2$ gas chemistry has been studied. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was used to investigate the chemical binding states of the etched surface. The plasma characteristics was extracted from optical emission spectroscopy (OES) and a single Langmuir probe. In this case of Pt etching using BCl$_3$/Cl$_2$ gas chemistries, the result of OES and Langmuir probe showed the increase of Cl radicals and ion current densities in the plasmas with increasing Cl$_2$ gas ratio. At the same time, XPS results indicated that the intensities of Pt 4f decreased with increasing Cl$_2$ gas ratio. The decrease of Pt 4f intensities implies the increase of residue layer thickness on the etched Pt surface.