How to determine an IP address

Solution

Note: This document contains information about determining your own local IP address and not obtaining obtaining an IP address of another computer or a website. If you want to know how the Internet sees your IP address use the system information tool.

Microsoft Windows users
Linux and Unix users
Apple computer users

Microsoft Windows Users

1. Click Start, Run, and type cmd or command to open a Windows command line.
2. From the prompt, type ipconfig and press enter. This should give you information similar to what is shown below.

Windows 2000 IP Configuration

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.101
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . .  : 192.168.1.1

As seen in the above example, the IP address as well as other important network information is listed when using the "ipconfig" command. If you have more than one network adapter, e.g. a wireless adapter and network adapter you'll see each adapter listed when using this command.

Home network and corporate network users

This information is the IP address of your computer in your network. If your computer is connected to the Internet the IP address shown in this screen will more than likely not be the IP address other people and web pages see. Use our System Information tool to see your online IP address.

Graphical representation of network settings

Microsoft Windows XP users may get a GUI representation of their network by right-clicking the network icon in their windows notification area and selecting "Status." Within the "Local Area Connection Status" window click the "Support" tab.

Microsoft Windows 98 users may also get a GUI representation of their network settings by clicking Start, Run, and typing ipconfig in the run line. Unfortunately, not all versions of Windows have this feature.

Linux and Unix, BSD 4.2+, and Apple OS X, Operating System Users

For Linux or Unix users, to view their IP address or network information, users must have administrator or root privileges.

1. Open the Linux or Unix shell if you are utilizing a GUI interface for your Linux or Unix machine.
2. From the prompt, type "ifconfig eth0" (without the quotes) and press enter. This should give you a listing of network information similar to what is seen below.

eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:A0:24:72:EB:0A inet addr:10.10.10.2 Bcast:10.0.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:5569799 errors:32 dropped:32 overruns:0 frame:6 TX packets:3548292 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:3 Collisions:14 Interrupt:18 Base address:0xda00

As seen from the above example, users will commonly see the network settings for all their network devices when running the "ifconfig" command. First in the above example we have the network settings for the "lo" or "local loopback", next is the actual network settings of your network adapter.

Home network and corporate network users

This information is the IP address of your computer in your network. If your computer is connected to the Internet the IP address shown in this screen will more than likely not be the IP address other people and web pages see. Use our System Information tool to see your online IP address.

Apple Macintosh Users

1. From the Apple menu, select the "Apple System Profiler"
2. Open the "Network overview"
3. Open "TCP/IP"

Within this window the user will be able to see the computer's network information including the IP address.

Home network and corporate network users

This information is the IP address of your computer in your network. If your computer is connected to the Internet the IP address shown in this screen will more than likely not be the IP address other people and web pages see. Use our System Information tool to see your online IP address.