What Is My Current IP Address ?

The Internet Protocol (IP) is a method in which data is sent to different computers over the internet. An Internet Protocol Address or IP Address is a numerical sequence such as 192.0.2.1 that uniquely identifies a network interface, or computer or other connected device (tablet, camera , printer or router). Each device have at least one IP Address. Using this identifier, other devices know how to reach it. There is 2 types of IP Addresses: IPv4 and IPv6.

IPv4 or Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is the first addressing infrastructure of the Internet, An IPv4 Address is a 32-bit value, a set of four numbers. Each number can range from 0 to 255. So, the full IPv4 addressing range goes from 0.0.0.0 to 255.255.255.255. Since every device that connects to the internet is assigned an IP address, there was a concern with the number of IP addresses we can allocate in IPv4. So a new format has bean created: The IPv6 format.

IPv6 is the successor to the IPv4. An IPv6 Address is a 128-bit alphanumeric value that identifies a device in an Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) network. IPv6 is new standard created to enable the trillions of new IP addresses to connect an ever-greater number of computing devices. An IPv6 Address is 128 bits long and is arranged in eight groups, each of which is 16 bits. Each group is expressed as four hexadecimal digits and the groups are separated by colons. An example of a Google IPv6 Address could be: 2607:f8b0:4004:814:0:0:0:200e

• With IPv4 being a 32-bit IP address and IPv6 being a 128-bit IP address, the number of available IP addresses increased drastically.
• IPv6 is based on an alphanumeric addressing values, while IPv4 is only numeric.
• IP security is optional in IPv4, while it is required in IPv6.
• IPv6 does not have any checksum fields.

The terms Private and Public IP Address relate to the network location, A private IP address is used inside a network, while a public one is used outside a network.

Feature	Private IP Address	Public IP Address
Purpose	Used for internal communication within a local network	Used for external communication over the internet
Assigned by	Assigned by the network administrator	Assigned by the Internet Service Provider (ISP)
Range	IANA reserved ranges: 10.0.0.0 - 10.255.255.255,172.16.0.0 - 172.31.255.255,192.168.0.0 - 192.168.255.255	Assigned from the range of globally unique IP addresses not reserved for private use
Accessibility	Only accessible within the local network and not reachable from the internet	Accessible from any location with internet access
Security	More secure as it's not accessible from the internet	Less secure as it's accessible from the internet
NAT usage	Often uses Network Address Translation (NAT) to map private IP addresses to public IP addresses	Not typically used with NAT
DHCP usage	DHCP is often used to automatically assign private IP addresses to devices within a network	DHCP is not typically used to assign public IP addresses
Static or dynamic	Private IP addresses can be static or dynamic	Public IP addresses are typically dynamic and may change frequently
Cost	No cost for usage	Additional cost for usage, usually paid to the ISP

To find your Private IP Address, do perform one of the following commands:
With hostname command: hostname -I
With ifconfig command: /sbin/ifconfig
With ip command: ip addr show

To find your Private IP Address from Windows:
Open a Command Prompt terminal and type ipconfig

To find your Public IP Address, do perform a DNS lookup against o-o.myaddr.l.google.com using the dig command:
dig +short ANY o-o.myaddr.l.google.com @ns1.google.com