Easy Ways to Find a MAC Address on Your Network or Computer

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Learn where to see the MAC addresses for IPs on your LAN
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Finding the media access control (MAC) address, or hardware address, for the hosts on your network is a fairly simple process. It involves the use of the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP), which converts IP addresses into MAC addresses. Whether you're using Windows, Mac, or Linux, you can use the "arp" command to find MAC addresses on your network. If you can't get what you need from the arp command, try NMAP , an open-source network scanner. You can also log in to your router's admin panel to see MAC addresses for all connected devices. Read on to learn how to find a MAC address on a network on any platform, as well as how to find your own device's MAC address .

Quickly Look Up MAC Addresses on a Network

  1. Open the command prompt (Windows) or Terminal (Mac & Linux).
  2. Type arp -a and press Enter or Return .
  3. Find each device's MAC address in the "Physical Address" column.
Section 1 of 4:

Find MAC Addresses on a Network Using ARP

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  1. 1
    Open your command prompt or terminal. Whether you're using Windows, Mac, or Linux, you can use the arp command to see a list of all MAC addresses on your local network.
    • On Windows, press the Windows key, type cmd , and press Enter.
    • On a Mac, open Terminal from the Launchpad.
    • On Linux, press Ctrl + Alt + T to open a terminal .
  2. If you're using a much older version of Windows, use arp /a instead. This command displays the current ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) cache tables. [1]
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  3. 3
    Find the MAC address for each IP address in the "Physical Address" column. The IP addresses in the list each have a MAC address associated with them.
  4. If you don't see the IP and MAC addresses of the device you're looking for, it's not in the ARP cache. If you ping the device's IP address or hostname (and it returns a response), it will then show in the ARP cache. To ping the address, type ping (IP Address) and press Enter or Return . For example, ping 192.168.1.112 .
    • If you're still not seeing the device you're looking for, try scanning your network with NMAP .
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Section 2 of 4:

Find MAC Addresses on a Network Using NMAP

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  1. 1
    Install NMAP on your computer. NMAP is a free network mapping tool that makes it easy to identify MAC addresses on your network. You can use it to find the MAC addresses for devices on your network. This is a great alternative to the arp command, especially if you don't know the IP addresses of devices on your network–it will provide some information about each device it reports on. [2]
    • On Windows and Mac, you can download NMAP from the NMAP website . Then, double-click the downloaded installer file and follow the on-screen instructions to install.
    • On Linux, search your distribution's package manager for nmap , or download the RPMs from the NMAP website.
    • If you're using Ubuntu or another Debian-based Linux distribution, install using sudo apt install nmap .
  2. 2
    Open the NMAP GUI (Zenmap). The easiest way to use NMAP is to use the graphical version, which you'll find in your application list. Just click Zenmap to get started. [3]
    • If you prefer a command-line interface, you can use nmap in your macOS or Linux terminal, as well as at the Windows command prompt. Use the command man nmap on Linux and Mac, or type nmap and press Enter on Windows to see the available options.
  3. 3
    Enter the subnet you want to scan. In the "Target" field, you'll need to enter the subnet your device is on. You'll want to enter it in CIDR notation. To find what to enter:
    • Open the Command Prompt (Windows) or a Terminal (Mac/Linux).
    • On Mac & Linux, type ip addr and press Return or Enter . Find the IP address next to "inet" for your network adapter–it will usually look something like 192.168.0.5/24 . If this were your IP address, you would enter 192.168.0.0/24 , or 192.68.0.* into the "Target" field.
    • On Windows, type ifconfig and press Enter . Find the IP Address for your local network–it will usually look something like 192.168.0.5 . If the subnet mask says 255.255.255.0 and your IP address is 192.168.0.5 , the address you'll be scanning is 192.168.0.0/24 , or 192.168.0.* .
      • If the subnet mask is not 255.255.255.0, refer to this CIDR notation cheatsheet to find out what to append to the end of your IP address based on your subnet.
  4. 4
    Select the Quick Scan profile and click Scan . This tells NMAP to run a quick scan of your network, which is all you'll need to identify MAC addresses and devices on the network. [4]
    • The scan may take a few moments. Once it's complete, you'll see some results.
  5. 5
    Find the MAC address for each device on your network. You will see a list of all IP addresses connected to your network, their MAC addresses, their product names, if available, and which ports are open on the device.
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Section 3 of 4:

Find MAC Addresses on a Network Using Your Router

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  1. Log in to your router's admin website. If you want to see the MAC addresses of all devices connected to your home or office router, you can typically find a list in your router's admin panel. This can be helpful if you're trying to figure out which devices are connected to your Wi-Fi network. If you're not sure how to do this, check out this helpful wikiHow guide .
    • Once you're logged in, look for an area of the website called Devices, Attached Devices, or DHCP clients to see a list of devices with MAC addresses and IP addresses.
Section 4 of 4:

Find Your Own Device's MAC Address

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  1. 1
    Windows Computer specialist Garnik Ovsepyan explains that you can find the MAC address of your Windows PC using the ipconfig /all command at the command prompt. Here's how: [5]
    • Press the Windows key on your keyboard.
    • Type cmd and press Enter .
    • Type ipconfig /all and press Enter .
    • Find the MAC address of each network card next to "Physical Address."
  2. 2
    Mac On your Mac desktop or MacBook, you can find your MAC address in System Settings: [6]
    • Click the Apple menu and select System Settings .
    • Click Network .
    • Select your network and click Details .
    • Click Hardware to find the MAC address.
  3. 3
    Linux On a Linux machine, you can find your MAC address using the ifconfig command, which also displays your IP address : [7]
    • Open a Terminal window.
    • Type ifconfig -a and press Enter or Return .
    • Find the MAC address next to "HWaddr."
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      • ARP is not a routed protocol, so it will only provide you with IP-to-MAC address information for your local network.
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      References

      1. ↑ https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/arp
      2. ↑ https://nmap.org/download.html
      3. ↑ https://nmap.org/zenmap/
      4. ↑ https://nmap.org/book/zenmap-scanning.html
      5. ↑ Garnik Ovsepyan. Computer Specialist. Expert Interview
      6. ↑ https://www.cmu.edu/computing/services/endpoint/network-access/mac-address.html
      7. ↑ https://ecs.rutgers.edu/how-find-your-physical-mac-address

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