How to Get a MAC Address from an IP Address on PC, Mac, & Linux

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Easily find the hardware address of a networked device

Co-authored by Stan Kats and Nicole Levine, MFA

Last Updated: October 8, 2025 Fact Checked

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Using Arp

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Using Getmac

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Using Nmap

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Using Your Router

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Tips

Do you need to find the MAC address of another computer on your network? Whether you're using Windows, macOS, or Linux, you can easily find the MAC address of any host on your local network using simple commands. We'll show you how to use commands like arp and getmac to find the MAC address for a specific IP or hostname, and how to use nmap and your router's admin panel to see all IP and MAC addresses on the network.

How to Get MAC Address from IP: Quick Steps

Open Command Prompt (Windows) or a Terminal (Mac/Linux).
Run the command ping ipaddress to contact the IP address.
Run arp -a ipaddress.
Find the MAC address under "Physical Address" or "HWaddr".

Method 1

Method 1 of 4:

Using the Arp Command

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1
Open a command prompt or terminal window. You can use the arp command on any operating system to find the MAC address of another computer on your network.
- If you're using Windows, type cmd into the Windows Search bar, then click Command Prompt.
  - You don't need to run Command Prompt as an administrator.
- On a Mac, type Terminal into Spotlight search, and then double-click Terminal.
- On Linux, press Ctrl + Alt + T or open a terminal window from your desktop environment.^{[1]
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2
Run ping ipaddress to contact the IP address. You must make contact with the remote computer so its MAC address will be added to the cache—pinging is an easy way to do this.^{[2]
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- If the ping doesn't stop on its own, press Ctrl + C (on both PC and Mac) to stop the ping.^{[3]
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- If you have the computer's hostname but not its IP address, just ping the hostname—this will give you the IP address, which you'll need for the next step.
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3
Run arp -a ipaddress to get the MAC address. The MAC address will appear under "Physical Address" in the arp results for Windows, and "HWaddress" on macOS and Linux.^{[4]
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- Keep in mind that MAC addresses aren't routable, so you can only get the MAC address from an IP address on your local network. It's not possible to resolve an IP to a MAC address for a computer that isn't on your network.

Method 2

Method 2 of 4:

Using the Getmac Command (Windows)

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If you can log in to the computer remotely with administrative access (and it's also running Windows), you can use the getmac command to view every MAC address on that device.^{[5]
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Research source} Type cmd into the Windows Search bar, right-click Command prompt, and then select Run as administrator.
2
Run the getmac command. The full command is getmac /s ipaddress /u username /p password.^{[6]
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- Replace ipaddress with the IP address or hostname of the remote computer.
- Replace username and password with an actual username and password that has administrator rights on the remote computer.
Each MAC address will appear next to a description of the interface type. If the interface isn't active, you'll see "Media disconnected" next to that MAC address.^{[7]
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Method 3

Method 3 of 4:

Scanning with Nmap

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You can use Nmap for Linux, Windows, or macOS to scan your local network and display the MAC and IP addresses of all connected computers.^{[8]
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Research source} You can download and install Nmap from nmap.org/download.html.
2
Open a new command prompt or terminal window.
- If you're using Windows, type cmd into the Windows Search bar, right-click Command Prompt, and then select Run as administrator.
- On macOS, type Terminal into Spotlight search, and then double-click Terminal.
- On Linux, press Ctrl + Alt + T or open a terminal window from your window manager.
3
Find your own local IP address. To scan your network, you'll need to know which subnet to scan.
- Windows: Run the ipconfig command.
- macOS: Open System Settings and go to Network > Advanced > TCP/IP.^{[9]
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- Linux: Run ip a.
4
Run the nmap command. The full command is nmap -sn xxx.xxx.xxx.*. Replace xxx.xxx.xxx.* with the network you want to scan. After a few moments, you'll see a list of all IP addresses on the network and their corresponding MAC addresses.
- For example, if your IP address is 10.0.0.3 and you want to scan all hosts on your subnet, you would use nmap -sn 10.0.0.*.

Method 4

Method 4 of 4:

Using Your Router

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1
Log in to your router's admin interface. If you want to find the MAC address of a device on your network, you can easily do so from the router itself. However, because all routers have different admin interface layouts, the steps will vary by device. To get started, go to your router's admin interface in a web browser, then log in using the admin username and password.
- Both the default address and username/password combo are usually printed on the router itself. Unless you manually changed the router's password, it's usually the default.
- If you can't find the router's username and password, check out this guide to finding a router password.
This might be called something like "Attached devices," "Connected devices," "Networked devices," "Network map," or similar. You may find it in a sub-section called "Advanced" or "Network."^{[10]
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Find the MAC address for the desired device. Once you find the right area, you will see a list of connected devices (by IP address and/or hostname). Locate the IP address of the device in the list to find its corresponding MAC address.
- You can use MAC addresses to set up filtering for specific devices on your router.

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Tips

You can only find the MAC address of a device that's on the same subnet as your own. It's not possible to find a remote computer's MAC address unless you can log into that computer remotely.

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If the computer you're trying to reach is behind a firewall, its MAC address may not be visible.

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