What's My IP Address & Location?

216.73.216.228

Your IPv6 Address

Your Geolocation

Your Internet Service Provider

To check your IP address using a script, use this URL: https://ip4.top10vpn.com/.

What Is an IP Address?

An IP address is a unique identifier for your device on a network such as the internet. It’s what tells the sites and apps you use where to send your traffic back to.

Every device connected to a network has one, from your phone and laptop to your smart bulb. Without specific IP addresses, devices wouldn’t be able to send and receive information from each other over the internet.

Your ISP assigns you a public IP address, and your router hands out private ones to each device inside your home. Most connections also run two protocols – IPv4 and IPv6 – so you often end up with more than one address active at once.

The address shown at the top of this page is your public IP, and is what all internet services see (and can log) when you use them.

IP addresses can also be a signal for your physical location. When a tool like ours detects an IP address, it can query one of several databases to find the geographical area where the IP address is mapped to. This ‘area’ is known as your IP’s geolocation.

IP address locations are not the most accurate, but they can reveal which city you appear to be located.

Public vs. Private IP Addresses

Public and private IP addresses do different jobs on different sides of your router.

Your public IP address is the one your ISP gives you, and every device in your home shares it.

Your private IP address identifies a single device inside your own network. Your router assigns one to each phone, laptop, printer, or smart device, and they never leave the network. Private IPs almost always start with 192.168., 10., or something in the 172.16. – 172.31. range.

Here’s how the two compare:

	Public IP address	Private IP address
Assigned by	Your internet service provider (ISP)	Your router
Where it works	The public internet	Your local network only
Visible to websites	Yes	No
Shared between devices	Yes, everyone in your home shares one	No, each device gets its own
Example	157.240.221.35	192.168.1.100
Costs money?	Sometimes (a static public IP is often a paid ISP add-on)	No

Seeing something else? An address starting 169.254. means your device failed to get an IP from the router. An internet-facing address between 100.64. – 100.127. means you’re behind Carrier-Grade NAT.

If you want to reach a device inside your network, like a printer, a router admin page, or a media server, you’ll use its private IP. For anything outside your network, your public IP is what is referenced.

Carrier-Grade NAT

Some connections add a third layer. Instead of giving you your own public IP address, your provider puts hundreds or thousands of customers behind a single IP address. This is called Carrier-Grade Nat (CGNAT), and it’s standard on mobile networks and increasingly common on fiber and rural broadband, as it lets an ISP stretch a dwindling supply of IPv4 addresses.

If you’re behind CGNAT, the address at the top of this page is still what websites see, but it isn’t exclusively yours. You’re sharing it with many other strangers who use the same ISP as you.

The giveaway is on your router. Open its status or WAN page and look at the internet-facing address. If it’s an IP between 100.64.0.0 and 100.127.255.255 then you’re behind CGNAT. On a normal connection, the router address matches the one shown at the top of this page.

Being behind CGNAT has three consequences:

Port forwarding won’t work. You can’t host a game server, security camera, or NAS that’s reachable from outside your network.
Remote access tools may fail. Nothing outside your network can connect to you your IP address directly, though many tools work around this with a relay service.
You inherit your neighbors’ reputation. A CAPTCHA loop or a site ban triggered by another customer on your shared address will affect you too.

If you need a reachable address, ask your ISP to move you off CGNAT. Some will do it for free on request, others may sell you a static IP address as an add-on. IPv6 isn’t affected, because CGNAT is a solution to work around the IPv4 address shortage.

IPv4 vs. IPv6 Addresses

IPv4 and IPv6 are two versions of the Internet Protocol. Both are in active use today.

IPv4 is the older version and still the most common. It uses 32-bit numbers written as four groups of digits separated by dots, such as 8.8.8.8, giving about 4.3 billion possible addresses. IPv4 ran out of fresh addresses years ago, and ISPs now use workarounds like NAT to stretch the supply.

IPv6 is the newer version and the long-term successor. It uses 128-bit numbers written as eight groups of hexadecimal digits separated by colons, giving 3.4×10³⁸ addresses. An example of an IPv6 address is 2001:db8:85a3:8d3:119:8a2e:370:1111.

Most modern connections run both protocols side by side, in an arrangement known as dual stack. Your device picks whichever one the website you’re visiting supports, so it’s normal to have two addresses active at once.

If you’re using a VPN, though, running both can cause a problem, as some VPNs might only handle IPv4 addressing, leaving your normal IPv6 in use and unprotected without you realizing it.

Why Are My IPv4 & IPv6 Addresses Different?

Most modern connections run IPv4 and IPv6 at the same time, an arrangement called dual stack. Having two addresses is normal and there’s nothing to fix.

Your device uses whichever protocol the website you’re visiting supports.

If you’re not using a VPN, you can stop reading here. The rest of this section is about what happens when a VPN only protects one of the two addresses.

IPv4 & IPv6 Location Mismatch

If you’re connected to a VPN and you’re seeing conflicting IPv4 and IPv6 location data, your VPN isn’t tunneling IPv6 properly.

What that means is that your real IPv6 address and location are still exposed. Any website or app that supports IPv6 will see straight past your VPN.

IP address leak diagram.

This is more common than it should be, and it’s one of the things we check for in every VPN we review.

How to Fix It

There are two options inside your VPN app to fix an IPv6 leak, and good VPNs have at least one:

Turn on IPv6 leak protection, sometimes labeled IPv6 blocking.
Enable full IPv6 support, if the VPN service actually offers it.

If your VPN has neither, you can disable IPv6 in your device’s network settings instead. Your connection will keep working perfectly well on IPv4 alone.

Learn how to do this on each platform in our guide to fixing IP leaks.

If you have both an IPv4 and an IPv6 address, IPv6 is usually the one your device prefers, so blocking it will stop the leak.

Run a VPN leak test to check for DNS and WebRTC leaks at the same time.

How to Hide Your Public IP Address

You have a few options to hide your IP address, but each one works in different ways.

Use a Virtual Private Network (VPN)

A VPN routes your traffic through a remote server and encrypts it on the way. Websites and apps see the server’s address instead of yours, and your ISP can see that you’re connected to a VPN but not what you’re doing.

Only the IP address of the VPN server is visible to the website server.

This is the most practical option for most people, because it covers everything on your device rather than one app, and it lets you choose which country you appear to be in.

There are caveats, though. A VPN doesn’t make you anonymous and you’re moving your trust from your ISP to the VPN service, so its logging policy and whether it’s been independently audited are key things to check.

Free VPNs in particular have a poor record, and our research has repeatedly found apps that leak data, embed trackers, or log the activity they claim not to. Our VPN rankings are based on our own testing rather than provider claims.

A VPN also won’t hide you if you’re logged into an account: Google or Facebook know it’s you whether or not your IP address has changed.

Use a Proxy

A web proxy swaps your IP address but adds no encryption of its own to your connection. HTTPS sites stay encrypted end to end, so the proxy can’t read what you send them, but it does see every domain you visit, and anything loaded over plain HTTP is fully readable to whoever runs the proxy. You usually set it up per application, often in a web browser, so anything outside the web application still uses your real IP address.

Proxies are lighter than VPNs, and often faster, which makes them fine for casually getting around a regional block.

They’re a bad choice for your online privacy, though. The proxy operator sees your real IP address and your full browsing history in one place, and with none of the accountability of an independently audited VPN, free public proxies are often run by people you’d rather not hand your traffic data to.

Use Tor

Tor bounces your traffic through three volunteer-run servers, also known as nodes, and no single server knows both who you are and where you’re going. It’s the strongest option available for hiding your address, and it’s free.

The trade-off is that Tor is very slow. Streaming and large downloads are impractical, and some websites block traffic from known Tor exit nodes outright.

If you don’t want your ISP to know that you’re using the Tor browser, you can use a VPN and Tor together.

Change Your IP without Hiding It

If you just want a different IP address, and aren’t interested in hiding your activity, here are three things you can do:

Restart your router. On most home connections your ISP will give you a new address within a few minutes, though sometimes you get the same one back.
Switch to mobile data. Your mobile carrier assigns a completely different public address.
Ask your ISP. Some will reassign your address on request, and some sell a static one as an add-on.

How to Find Your Private IP Address

Your devices also have private IP addresses, which only exist inside your own home network. Those are the ones starting 192.168. or 10., and no external website ever sees them.

Your private IP identifies a single device on your own network. You’ll need it for things like setting up a printer, forwarding a port, or pointing one device at another.

Here’s where to find your private IP address:

Windows 10 & 11

Open the Start menu, then go to Settings > Network & Internet.
Select Wi-Fi or Ethernet, depending on how you’re connected.
Click the network you’re connected to, then scroll down to Properties.
Your IPv4 address, IPv6 address, and DNS server address are all listed here.

There’s a faster route if you’re comfortable with the command line: press Windows + R, type cmd, and run ipconfig. Your private IP is the IPv4 Address line under your active network adapter, and Default Gateway is your router.

macOS

Open System Settings, then Network.
Click Wi-Fi.
Connect to a network, then select Details on the right.
Your IP address is listed here.

iOS & iPadOS

Open Settings and tap Wi-Fi.
Tap the info icon next to the network you’re connected to.
Your IPv4 and IPv6 addresses are both listed here, along with your router’s address.

Android

Open Settings and tap Connections, or Network & internet depending on your phone.
Tap the Wi-Fi network you’re connected to.
Tap the cog icon next to the network name.
Your IP address is listed here.

Linux

Run ip addr show in a terminal. Your private IP is the inet value on your active interface, usually wlan0 for Wi-Fi or eth0 for wired.

Useful Resources & Tools

Resources

Tools

FAQs

How do I look up my IP address?

For your public IP, the fastest way is to load this page on the device you want to check.

For your private IP, run ipconfig in Command Prompt on Windows, or ip addr show in Terminal on Linux and macOS.

From a terminal or a script, curl https://ip4.top10vpn.com returns your public IPv4 address as plain text.

What is my IP address on my phone?

It depends on how your phone is connected. On mobile data, your carrier assigns your phone its own public IP, completely separate from your home connection. Open this page on the phone itself to see it.

On Wi-Fi, your phone shares your home network’s public IP with every other device in the house.
Either way, its private IP is under Settings > Wi-Fi on both iOS and Android.

Why Is My IP Location Wrong?

IP geolocation works from network routing records rather than GPS, so it shows where your ISP routes your traffic: often a regional hub in a different city. Country level results are reliable, city level is a rough guess, and mobile or business connections tend to be even less accurate.

Why Does My IP Address Keep Changing?

Most home connections use dynamic addressing, so your ISP reassigns addresses periodically instead of fixing yours permanently. Restarting your router, an ISP network refresh, or joining a different network will each change it.

Is My IP Address the Same on All My Devices?

Every device on your network shares one public IP address, but each has its own private IP. On phones and tablets, when you switch to cellular data, your device leaves the Wi-Fi network and gets a different public address from your carrier.

Can Someone Hack Me if They Know My IP Address?

Not on its own. Your router drops unsolicited incoming connections by default, so there’s nothing exposed to connect to. The realistic risks are that people can see roughly where you are, and gamers can occasionally get hit with DDoS attacks. Any port you’ve deliberately opened is the exception and needs securing properly.

Can Someone Find My Home Address from My IP?

No. An IP address points to the network that owns it, not to a building. An IP lookup gives a general area at best, not a precise location. Your ISP holds the record linking the address to your account, and that only comes out through a court order or security breach.