What Is an IP Address? A Beginner's Guide

2026-07-01 · IPV4 Scanner

An IP address is a unique label assigned to every device on a network, letting devices find and talk to each other. There are two versions in use today: IPv4 (e.g. 192.0.2.1) and the newer IPv6 (e.g. 2001:db8::1), which exists because the world ran out of IPv4 addresses.

Public vs Private

Public IPs are routable on the internet, while private ranges (10.x.x.x, 172.16–31.x.x, 192.168.x.x) are reserved for local networks like your home Wi-Fi.

Try It Yourself

Use our IP Location Finder to see the details behind any IP address, or look up a domain's registration with WHOIS.

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