How to Determine the IP Address on a Mac

When a Mac operating system computer connects to a network, it is assigned an address called an IP address (Internet Protocol address). An IP address has four character ranges separated by spaces, each with a maximum of three characters. When a Mac is connected to a network (typically the Internet), it carries a private (internal) IP address, marking its location in the local network, and a public (external) IP address. is the IP address of the Internet connection you are using. You can follow the instructions below to find both of those addresses.

Table of Contents

Determine the internal IP address (on OS X 10.5 and later)

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Click the Apple icon in the upper left corner of the screen.

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Scroll down, select System Preferences.

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Click the Network item on the third line.

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Choose your connection method. Usually, the computer will be connected to the network via AirPort (wireless network) or Ethernet (wired network). Connected status will appear next to the network connection you are using. You should see the IP address listed in a smaller font size, just below the Status status.

The active connection method is usually set by default.

Determine the internal IP address (on OS X 10.4)

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Click the Apple icon in the upper left corner of the screen.

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Scroll down, select System Preferences .

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Click on the Network item located on the third line.

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Select your connected network. We can select the network we want to see the IP address from in the Show drop-down menu. If you use a wired connection, select Built-In Ethernet. If you are using a wireless connection, select AirPort.

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Click the TCP/IP (internet protocol suite) tab. Your IP address will show up in the setup window. ^{[1] X Research Source}

Find the internal IP address using Terminal

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Access the Terminal tool. You can find it in the Utilities section of the Application folder.

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Use the “ifconfig” command. The normal “ifconfig” command will produce a lot of unnecessary data and cause a bit of confusion for the user. The following command will show your internal IP address, and remove most of the unnecessary information:

ifconfig | grep "inet" | grep -v 127.0.0.1 ^{[2] X Research Source}

This command will remove item 127.0.0.1, the data will always appear no matter what kind of computer you use. This is a type of repeated response that you can ignore if you are only interested in IP addresses.

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Copy IP address. Your IP address will be displayed next to the “inet” entry.

Find your external IP address

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Go to your router (router) configuration page. Almost the entire router can be accessed through the web interface, where users can view and adjust settings. Open the web interface by typing the router’s IP address into a web browser. Look through your router’s reference to find the specific router address. The most common router addresses are:

192.168.1.1
192.168.0.1
192.168.2.1

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Open Router Status. The location of the external IP address for each router is different. Most of them show up in Router Status or WAN (Wide Area Network) Status. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

Under Internet Port in Router Status, your IP address will be displayed in full. It consists of 4 sequences of characters, each with a maximum of 3 characters.
This is the IP address of the router you use. Any connection made from this router carries that IP address.
This IP address is assigned to you by your carrier. Most public IP addresses are “dynamic,” meaning they change over time. This address can be hidden using a proxy server.

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Search on Google with the keyword “ip address” or “ip address”. The first displayed result is your external/public IP address.

Advice

Once done with Terminal, you can type “exit”, however, the window will not be closed completely. To close the program, you need to use the top toolbar, select Terminal -> Close.
If you want to use the Terminal window more conveniently, drag it and drop it into the dock.
To find out your IP address on a Windows computer, see also related WikiHow articles.

Warning

When using an IP address information website from an Internet service provider, we are using a transparent proxy homepage (such as VNPT), be careful because this indirect IP address can be a Your carrier’s IP, not your real IP address.

Steps