What is my IP address?
Your IP address is the public number that identifies your internet connection. Every time you open a website, send an email or stream a video, the server on the other side sees this address, because it needs to know where to send the response. The box above shows the address that websites see right now, detected the moment you opened this page.
It is usually not the address of your computer. At home, your router gets one public IP from your
internet provider and shares it with every device on your network: your laptop, your phone and your smart TV all
appear to the outside world with the same address. Inside your home, each device has a private address like
192.168.1.23, which nobody on the internet can see.
IPv4 vs IPv6: why you may have two addresses
There are two versions of the Internet Protocol in use today, and this page checks both at the same time.
| IPv4 | IPv6 | |
|---|---|---|
| Example | 203.0.113.42 | 2001:db8:85a3::8a2e:370:7334 |
| Format | 4 numbers from 0 to 255 | 8 groups of hexadecimal digits |
| Total addresses | About 4.3 billion | 340 undecillion (practically unlimited) |
| Shared between users? | Often (NAT, carrier-grade NAT) | Rarely, each device can have its own |
IPv4 addresses ran out more than a decade ago, so providers now share them between many customers or hand out IPv6 addresses instead. If you have both, your device prefers IPv6 when a website supports it and falls back to IPv4 otherwise. If the IPv6 box says "No IPv6 connectivity detected", your provider or router simply does not offer IPv6 yet. That is not an error, and everything keeps working over IPv4.
How to read the results
- Your public IPv4 / IPv6: the addresses websites see. Use the copy button to paste them into a firewall rule, a support ticket or a server allowlist.
- Location: the city, region and country where the IP is registered or routed. It is an estimate based on a geolocation database, not GPS.
- ISP / Organization: the company that owns the network your IP belongs to, usually your internet provider, mobile carrier, VPN provider or employer.
- ASN: the Autonomous System Number of that network, a unique ID used for routing on the internet (for example AS3352 or AS15169).
- Time zone (device): the time zone configured on your device. If it does not match the IP location, you may be using a VPN or travelling.
- Browser and user agent: the browser and operating system you are using, as reported by your browser. Support teams often ask for this.
How accurate is the location?
IP geolocation is approximate. The country is correct in the vast majority of cases, but the city can be off by tens of kilometres, because the database knows where your provider's equipment is, not where you are sitting. Mobile connections are the least precise: they often appear in the city where the carrier's gateway is, which can be hundreds of kilometres away. Corporate networks and VPNs show the location of the company office or the VPN server.
Nobody can find your street address from your IP alone. Only your internet provider knows which customer had a given IP at a given time, and it only shares that with the authorities under a legal order.
Common reasons to check your IP
- Testing a VPN: turn the VPN on and reload this page. If the IP, location and ISP change to the VPN's, it works. If your real IPv6 address still shows, the VPN is leaking IPv6.
- Remote access and allowlists: servers, databases and admin panels often allow access only from specific IPs. Copy your address and add it to the allowlist.
- Gaming and hosting: to host a game server or reach a home camera, friends need your public IP (and a port forward on your router).
- Troubleshooting: support teams ask for your IP to find your connection in their logs, or to check whether it is blocked.
- Checking for a blocklist: if websites keep showing captchas, your shared IP may have a bad reputation because of another user.
Static vs dynamic IP addresses
Most home connections have a dynamic IP: your provider can assign a different address when your router restarts, after a few days, or every time you connect on mobile. That is why the address you see today may be different tomorrow. A static IP never changes and is usually a paid add-on for businesses that run servers or need a fixed address for allowlists. If you need a stable name for a dynamic IP, use a dynamic DNS service.
Public vs private IP addresses
Some ranges are reserved for private networks and never appear on the public internet:
10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12 and 192.168.0.0/16 for IPv4, and
fc00::/7 for IPv6. Your router uses them to number the devices in your home. If you see one of these on
your computer's network settings, that is your local address. The address on this page is the public one.
A special case is carrier-grade NAT (100.64.0.0/10): some providers, especially mobile
carriers, put many customers behind a single public IPv4. If your router shows a WAN address starting with
100.64–100.127, you do not have your own public IPv4, which makes hosting servers or port
forwarding impossible without IPv6 or a paid option.
How to hide or change your IP address
- VPN: encrypts your traffic and replaces your IP with the VPN server's. The easiest option for privacy and for appearing in another country.
- Tor Browser: routes your traffic through several volunteer servers. Very private but slower.
- Proxy: forwards your browser's traffic through another server. It usually does not encrypt anything.
- Restart your router: on many dynamic connections this gives you a new IP from the same provider.
- Switch networks: mobile data, a café's Wi-Fi or your office network all have different public IPs.
Is it safe that websites can see my IP?
Seeing your IP is how the internet works, and on its own it is not dangerous. Websites use it to send you pages, choose a language, block abuse and show local content. The main risks are being tracked across sites, which ad blockers and VPNs reduce, and attacks on open services on your router, which a firewall and regular firmware updates prevent. Keep your router updated and do not expose services to the internet unless you need to.
We do not store the IP addresses of visitors to this page. Your address is used only to answer your request. If you want to know more about an IP, for example one you found in your server logs, use our IP Lookup tool.