IP Look up IP Address

Location
If you can find out the IPv4 or IPv6 address of an
Internet user, you can get an idea what part of the
country or world they're in by using our IP Lookup
tool. What to do: Enter the IP address you're
curious about in the box below, then click "Get IP
Details."

Enter IP Address...

GET IP DETAILS

How to get someone's

IP address
Once you have an IP address it is as easy as pasting
and clicking above. But if you don't know how to
get someone's IP address read: 11 Ways To Get
Someone's IP Address

What you will get with

this tool
! The ISP and organization's name

! The IP's host name

! The country it's in

! The region/state

! The city (see below)

! The latitude and longitude of the

location (a best guess)

! The area code for that region

! Any known services running on

that IP

What you won't get

You won't get anything like...

" A person's name

" The exact location or street

address

" A phone number

" Their email address

That's where privacy issues come in, which are

there to protect Internet users like you.

A word about
accuracy
In countries outside the US and Europe the
accuracy for the city level 25mile/40km radius is
around 55%.

99%
COUNTRY

90%
STATE/
REGION

81%
CITY
(<25MI/40KM)

Your private information may be exposed!

HIDE MY IP ADDRESS NOW

More facts and details

about looking up IP
addresses
Pretty much all that anyone cares about when we
go on the Internet is that our connection works. We
leave all the connectivity issues to people who
know what they’re doing. Still, a little knowledge
can go a long way. You don’t have to be a computer
science major to grasp some of the issues involved
with how you connect to the internet.

In fact, there may be times when you need to know

something technical...like finding your IP address.

“What Is My IP Address?”
As you’re reading this, you’re on the website
WhatIsMyIPAddress.com, and you probably first
came here to check your IP address.

You wanted to know the following:

1. Your IP address at home, because perhaps IT

person needed to know it to do some
troubleshooting or to help you connect to
the internet.
2. You wanted to see your IP address because
you’re using what’s called a VPN (Virtual
Private Network), which masks your “actual”
IP address with another. You wanted to
make sure your VPN is working as it should.

The good news, when you land on the

WhatIsMyIPAddress.com home page, you instantly
and automatically see your connected IP address.

The story behind

WhatIsMyIPAddress.com
It wasn’t always so easy to find your own IP
address, according to Chris Parker, CEO and
founder of WhatIsMyIPAddress.com.

“Way back in the mid-nineties, there wasn’t an easy

way for people to look up or find out their own IP
address,” Parker says. “It was a frustrating
problem, because if someone needed to find it out
to solve a connectivity issue, you’d need help doing
it. So, once I found out the process, I created a
small program that would help out the IT
community. I eventually made my solution
available to everyone. And then I put it on a
website.”

Chris put his solution on a website, calling it “

WhatIsMyIPAddress.com.” He didn’t pay much
attention to it for a while, but soon realized that
thousands of people were visiting his website. He
was running his website on the side while he
continued to work full-time in an IT capacity. Not,
long after that, he moved on from his full-time job
and decided to focus on his full-time.

IP Lookup Tools and more

Chris Parker was surprised to discover that
thousands of people were coming to his website
weekly. Soon, he would develop additional tools
and content to give people more help and
information they might want and couldn’t find
easily elsewhere.

As an example, he realized that many people might

want to verify a location of someone whom they
were connecting with. Much of that had to do with
catching people in a lie and fraud prevention.

For instance, If a person says they’re a soldier

stationed in California, but when you looked up
their IP address, you discovered their connection
places them in India, that would be something to
be concerned about.

The IP Lookup tool (the page you’re on right now)

does just that. It’s a simple way to get some
information on a computer-user without invading
their privacy.

The IP Lookup page and tool provides the same

information about an IP address that you can find
about your own IP address. It’s what you see at the
top of this page, and the Show Complete IP
Details page as well, when you click on the link.

The information you find

from the IP Lookup page
On the IP Lookup page, you’ll get a quick overview
of the following:

The IP address detected and information about

your IP address:

ISP: Internet Service Provider

City the IP address is in
Region and country

On that same page, you’ll see a link: Show

Complete IP Details, which when you click on it
will show:

Decimal
Host name
ASN: a specific number
ISP
Services: Any known services running on that
IP
Assignment: refers to type of IP address
Country
State or region
City
Latitude and longitude of the location (a
proximity)
Area code for that region

Finally, you’ll see a map that “pinpoints” (a “best

proximity” of) your location on a map. This helps
ensure that the internet has an idea of where
you’re connecting from. Think of how valuable that
is when you’re looking for relevant services.

And again, this information is public. Anyone on

the internet, from companies you do business with
to friends and family you email with, can see your
IP Address and lookup up details on it.

If you know someone’s IP,

up can put it in the IP
Lookup tool
There are a variety of ways others can get your IP
address and all of them are legal because your IP
address is public and visible and is included
(although hidden) in your communications online.

In other words, your IP address is included in the

“request transactions” when you send someone an
email or visit a website. It’s how you communicate
and how you tell the website how to send
information back to you.

By the way, it’s also the IP address that the internet

sees—that is, if someone you’re connected with
(the DMV, Amazon.com, a department store)
wanted to know your IP address, they have easy
ways to find out.

An IP address is public. The

whole world can see it if
they want
Now, for the most part, having your IP address
“exposed” to the world doesn’t present any
dangers or worries. If someone were to hack your
home network, that problem wouldn’t extend
beyond your IP address.

Still, as you can see from the IP Lookup page,

someone can get a “digital profile” of sorts if they
know your IP address. After all, it’s public
information, as is your home or business address.

And while your IP address doesn’t reveal your

name, home address and other details, it does tell
someone (or some entity, such as a government
agency) what city or region you’re in.

If they use the IP Lookup tool they can find that

out...but so can anyone, and that’s not necessarily
a bad or evil thing, but it can be annoying.

Businesses like knowing

where their online business
(or inquiries) are coming
from
Companies can get a profile of where their online
customers or prospects are coming from, based on
the number of “business or business inquiries
coming” from IP addresses from a certain region.

That type of easy-to-gain and legal data could be

valuable to them for marketing or product
development purposes. They don’t need to know
names and addresses—just knowing that online
shoppers from a certain region, county or Zip Code
have been showing interest in a product or service.

All that free and public information comes courtesy

of IP addresses.

If you’re connected, you

have an IP Address
Your IP address is at the heart of being online.
Here’s another way to look at it: If you don’t have
an IP address, you’re not connected to a network
that’s connected to the Internet. Also, other
computers connected to the internet can’t send
you information you want.

Simple, right? Yes...and no. It’s rather brilliant that

an IP address connects you to the world via a
worldwide network, in much the same way your
home’s, apartment’s, or business’s physical
address connects you to a mail/postal and/or
package delivery system.

So, while it seems simple, the technology, thinking

and design behind it all is impressive, elegant and
best of all, it works all the time.

Here’s an explanation and some background on

the IP address, in non-technical terms.

“IP” (the IP address) is part

of the TCP/IP Protocol.
Don’t let that scare you o! too quickly. As we said,
we cover technical terms because their relevance,
but few of us need to know the intricate details of
how networking works. For example, your IT
person at work or someone helping you set up a
special connection knows how to find your IP
address and use it to provide it to networks.

The good news is that the behind-the-scenes

details about IP protocols and networks operate
seamless and automatically, thanks to the bright
people who created it.

The IP in TCP/IP stands for Internet Protocol. The

TCP part stands for Transmission Control
Protocol. A protocol, if you look up the word up,
means rules or agreed upon processes. The string
of numbers and dots you see with your IP address
are at the heart of those protocols and what they
mean and do. (For more details, read our article on
the topic.)

For networking purposes, your computer is called a

host. When you’re connected to the internet, your
host has a number assigned to it...the IP address.
It’s aways “IP address,” not the “Internet Protocol
address. Sometimes it’s simply called your IP.

There are other numbers that identify your

computer, such as a MAC address, but the IP
address is where the connectivity happens.

By the way, your computer has a name, too. You

probably don’t even know what it is by now, but at
one point in time either you or somebody you
know gave it a name. It could be “Mikes PC” or
“Dads Laptop,” for instance. It simply identifies the
device, but that’s good enough. That name is
registered somewhere in your network, so it knows
the IP address assigned to that device.

But it’s your computer’s IP address that is the ticket

to getting on the internet; it’s what identifies a
computer as ready and able to connect to the
internet.

Who is managing the

protocols?
TCP/IP isn’t the only protocol involved with
connecting to the internet, because there is an
entire set involved. TCP/IP is called the TCP/IP stack
or sometimes the protocol suite.

No one group or company or government is

controlling the internet, which is a good thing. Also,
not one organization owns the protocols. Rather
there are a handful of organizations that review,
shape and guide the protocols and internet
policies.

Here are some of them:

ICANN. The Internet Corporation for Assigned

Names and Numbers. It’s a non-profit group run
by a board of directors from various countries.

IAB. Internet Activities Board. This group is

responsible for overseeing the protocols and
includes other committees focusing on internet
issues.

IETF. The Internet Engineering Task Force. This

is a group of dozens of committees (more than 70)
whose focus is on keeping the internet going
without stop.

ISOC. The Internet Society. They are focused on

where the internet is headed. ISOC members come
from corporations, government organizations and
select people. Many of the other groups above are
also part of ISOC.

The ISOC and the ICANN are the primary groups

managing the internet.

If you want to read a non-technical book about the

history of networking and how the internet came
about—the key people, organizations and events
that took place—read Walter Isaacson’s best-selling
book, “The Innovators.” It’s a non-technical account
of how all of the connectivity we have today came
about.

What is an RFC?
Because technology is constantly changing and the
internet continues to grow, protocols are
continually being refined, changing and created.
That happens through a process called Request for
Comments, or RFC, which is run by a group that is
a major part of the Internet Society.

RFCs breakdown into various categories, for

organization, depending on the RFC’s “stage of
development.” Three categories, which are
identified as the standards track for the following:

Standard (STD)
Draft standard
Proposed standard

Other categories simply help manage all content

related to RFCs, such as BCP (best current
practices), Historic (a catalog of all past and
obsolete RFCs) and EXP (Experimental), indicating a
research or development project.

The RFC process, which is key to TCP/IP

development, is actually a very democratic and
transparent process. Quite likely, new ideas for
improving TCP/IP come from groups and
individuals that are part of one of the key internet
groups and committees. Most of these
organizations are open to receiving ideas and
inquiries and you can find out how to contact them
online.

Moving between software

and hardware
If TCP/IP is a protocol for communicating on
networks, there has to be hardware involved that
speaks the same language. After all, software
resides on hardware and networking devices.

Where TCP/IP is concerned, it’s important to know

about network technology that’s everywhere there
is a connection—Ethernet. More specifically,
Ethernet is the technology that is behind Local
Area Networks, or LAN. Ethernet is what makes it
possible to send data here and there for every type
of device. TCP/IP controls the functions that sends
data to hardware and even connects di!erent
computer hardware.

The key component for communication is a

network interface card (NIC). It’s also called a
network adapter or network card. These pieces of
the networking puzzle are being changed and
streamlined all the time. NIC is what allows your
computer to connect to a network, whether by a
cable or wirelessly.

More importantly, every NIC is hardcoded on it and

has a unique hardware address that’s called the
Media Access Control, or MAC. A handful of
protocols communicate with MAC.

A Local Area Network connected by Ethernet, from

a desktop and laptop to a printer, all have both NIC
and TCP/IP software running on it.

The arrival of IPv6

For the most part, a majority of the IP addresses in
use today are IPv4, which stands for “Version 4.”
The IP address numbers we get assigned, derived
from the TCP/IP protocols, is a unique code for the
Internet, the biggest network we use to connect to
the world.

Until around 2015, your IP address wasn’t referred

to as an IPv4 type: It was just your IP address. But
then, the people who were part of monitoring and
improving the internet realized that, to their
surprise, there weren’t going to be enough new
and available IP addresses “indefinitely.” That’s
when a new version began gaining exposure and
usage.

It was labeled IPv6. (Note: There is no word on

what happened to IPv5, for some reason.)

So now, when you go to the

WhatIsMyIPAddress.com home page (MyIP), you’ll
see your current IP address in current IPv4 format,
and you’ll also see an IPv6 address if one is found
to be active. If not it will read “not detected.” In
fact, “WhatIsMyIPAddress.com was the first IP
address lookup website to make both IPv4 and
IPv6 visible.

You needn’t worry about your IP address or what

version you’re using. Either will work and you’ll
never notice the di!erence. IPv6 doesn’t provide
any type of connectivity advantage.

Still, you might be wondering how the experts in all

this were almost caught short. Here’s how this all
came about.

Not enough to go around

In the media, there was a sense of urgency that the
world was going to run out of IP addresses. No one
would have anticipated that nearly 40 years ago.
The way IP addresses were mathematically derived
seem to ensure that it would not happen. In the
1980s, people thought that 4.3 billion IP addresses
would be enough.

IP addresses likely seemed like sand on the beach.

There would always be plenty. Not so. The people
who monitor the internet saw a problem looming.
They recognized that at the rate the internet was
exploding, there would soon be no regular IPv4
addresses available to the organizations
responsible for distributing them.

So, the IP organizations headed the problem o! by

getting the next generation of IP addresses (IPv6)
available to the world. This time, there’d be no
chance of coming close to running out of IP
addresses again. (Although, we’ve heard that
before).

And because of all the organizations involved with

keeping tabs on the internet, TCP/IP protocols and
everything else, there wasn’t a true panic to rush
the e!ort in order to provide plenty of new,
available IP addresses. The committees that were
responsible for ensuring the running of the
internet had thankfully planned ahead.

A little bit about IPv6

addresses
IPv6 addresses are longer, which the way things
work out, means there can be trillions of them
available.

To start with, they are made up of 128 bits—IPv4

addresses are only 32 bits. Because of its 128-bit
format of the IPv6 address, the Internet will not run
out of them ever. Let’s contrast: The number of
IPv4 addresses (that were set to exhaust
themselves at 4.3 billion) to the IPv6 format that
will make an almost innumerable number of IP
addresses available.

How many? Here’s a breakdown of that number:

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