← IP Addressing & Subnetting learning pathIP Addressing & Subnetting · Module 1 of 10
What is an IP address?
IP addresses identify devices on a network.
📖 Key ideas
- Every device on an IP network needs an address.
- IPv4 addresses are 32 bits written as four octets: 192.168.1.10.
- Each octet ranges from 0 to 255.
- An address has a network part and a host part.
- IPv6 uses 128 bits to solve IPv4 exhaustion.
💡 Real-life example: An IP address is a postal address: the network part is the street, the host part is the house number.
IPv432-bit IP address
Octet8-bit group of an IPv4 address
Network portionIdentifies the network
Host portionIdentifies the device