Many times it happens that you feel the need to know the IP address of your device. Internet Protocol address or IP address is a set of numeric digits that are needed to identify your device and enable network communication because all the devices that are connected through a network know each other only through their IP addresses. Moreover, the IP address also specifies the location of a device. So it becomes necessary for you at times to know what is the IP address of whichever device you are using. Now how to find this IP address is the real question. In the article below, we will tell you all the ways through which you can find the IP address of your device while working in a Linux environment, in our case, Ubuntu 22.04. The same commands will work on the new Ubuntu 22.04 version too.
This tutorial will show you how to check your IP address on Linux systems like Ubuntu, Linux Mint and Debian using the command line. I will also explain the differences between private and public IP addresses, discuss the various network interfaces, and explain the ip route command and its role in network address translation.
The first step is to understand the two types of IP addresses: private and public. Private IP addresses are used within a local network or internet connection and cannot be reached from outside of that connection. Public IP addresses, however, can be accessed from anywhere in the world.
If you're using an Ubuntu system, you can get your personal IP address by using this command: ifconfig . This will list all of your active network interfaces along with their associated private or public IP addresses.
Another way to get your public/private IPs is by entering ip route in the terminal window. This command shows all currently active routes along with their corresponding source/destination networks. You can then use these routes to trace out which devices are connected to your computer’s network interfaces – this includes public/private IPs allocated by DHCP servers such as routers.
Finally, if you're connected to a router via an ethernet cable or Wi-Fi (wireless) connection, then it's likely that Network Address Translation (NAT) is being used – this means that requests sent from one machine inside the same local area network are being translated so that they appear as if they came from one single device with a single IPS address when viewed from outside of the LAN. To check if NAT is enabled in your current setup, use tracroute followed by any website domain name (e.g., google.com). The result should show whether or not packets are routed through NAT before reaching their destination web server - if so then NAT is enabled and working correctly!
Four ways to find your current IP Address in Linux
Following are the four methods through which you can find the IP address of your device:
Method # 1: On the Desktop
The first method of finding the IP address of your device is through the Linux desktop interface. For this, you need to proceed as follows:
Click on your network connection icon (Wi-Fi icon) at the top right of the title bar on which Ubuntu Desktop is written. A cascading menu will appear, which is shown below:
From the menu shown above, click on Connection Information. A new Connection Information window will appear, which is shown below:
In the window shown above, the red highlighted rectangle shows the IP address of your device written in front of IP Address field.
Method #2: On the Shell with ip command
The second method of finding the IP address of your device is through a terminal command. To do this, you need to perform the following steps:
First, open the terminal by pressing Ctrl+ T or you can click on the terminal icon directly if it is shown on your taskbar. You can also click on the search icon located on the taskbar and then type Terminal and press enter to open it. The newly opened terminal window is shown below:
Type the command ip addr show in the terminal and press enter.
ip addr show
This command is shown below:
As soon as you press enter, some information will be displayed on the terminal window. From the information shown below in the terminal screen, the highlighted rectangle shows the IP address of your device besides the inet field.
Method # 3: On the Shell with ifconfig command
The third method of finding the IP address of your device is through another terminal command. For this, you need to follow the steps mentioned below:
Launch the terminal by pressing Ctrl+ T or clicking on the terminal icon, or searching for terminal in the search window shown below and pressing enter.
Then type the command:
/sbin/ifconfig
in the newly opened terminal window and press enter.
As soon as you press enter, a lot of information will be displayed on the terminal screen. From the displayed information below, the highlighted rectangle shows the IP address of your device beside the field of inet addr.
The ifconfig command works in the same way for finding the IP address of a device using terminal in Linux as ipconfig command works for finding the IP address of a device using command prompt in Windows.
Method # 4: On the Shell by using the hostname command
Method four for finding the IP address of your device makes use of yet another terminal command. For this method, you need to follow the following steps:
Launch the terminal by pressing Ctrl+ T or clicking on the terminal icon located on the taskbar or search for terminal in the search window and press enter.
When the terminal window appears, type the command:
hostname -I
and press enter. This command is shown in the following window:
As soon as you will press enter, the IP address of your device will be displayed on the terminal right below your entered command. This is shown below:
Conclusion
By using any of the methods listed above, you can find the IP address of your device very quickly and enable a very safe and secure network communication through it. IP address gives an identity to your device so that you can recognize it whenever you want to. Once you know the IP address of your device, you are free to interact with any other device that is connected to the same network to which you are connected. I hope that this article will help you a lot in the future.