How You Can Find the IP Address of Any Website in Just a Few Clicks

Online services provide free information about IP addresses

By
Bradley Mitchell
Bradley Mitchell
Writer
  • Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • University of Illinois
An MIT graduate who brings years of technical experience to articles on SEO, computers, and wireless networking.
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Updated on September 11, 2020
Reviewed by
Chris Selph
Chris Selph headshot
Reviewed by Chris Selph
Chris Selph is a CompTIA-certified technology and vocational IT teacher. He also serves as network & server administrator and performs computer maintenance and repair for numerous clients.
lifewire's editorial guidelines

The ping utility looks up IP addresses of websites and other kinds of running network devices. Ping attempts to contact the site by name and reports back with the IP address it finds, along with other information about the connection.

Ping is a Command Prompt command in Windows. For example, to find the IP address of Example.com on a desktop computer, use the command-line interface instead of the graphical interface, and enter the command: 

ping lifewire.com
Ping command IP address screenshot

The command returns a result similar to the following, which contains the IP address:

  • Pinging example.com [​255.255.255.255] with 32 bytes of data: . . .

Both the Google Play and Apple App stores contain many apps that generate these same pings from a mobile device.

Many large websites do not return connection information in response to ping commands as a security measure. However, you'll still see the site's IP address. The ping method fails if the website is temporarily unreachable or if the computer used to perform the ping is not connected to the internet.

Use the Internet WHOIS System

An alternative method for finding website IP addresses relies on the internet WHOIS system. WHOIS is a database that tracks website registration information, including owners and IP addresses.

WHOIS doesn't always provide IP address information. You may want to try a different method first.

To look up website IP addresses with WHOIS, visit one of the public sites such as who.is or networksolutions.com that offer WHOIS database query services. Searching for a particular site name produces a result similar to the following:

  • Current Registrar: REGISTER.COM, INC.
  • IP Address: 207.241.148.80 (ARIN & RIPE IP search)
The WHOIS information for Lifewire.com

In the WHOIS method, the IP addresses are stored statically in a database and don't require the website to be online or reachable over the internet.

WhatsMyIPAddress.com

WhatsMyIPAddress.com is a popular website where you can look up your public IP address. It also has a simple tool to let you look up the IP of websites. Open a browser and visit the site. Searching is as simple as entering the name of the site you want into the search field and running the search. You'll instantly see the IP addresses used by your site.

WhatsMyIPAddress IP search screenshot

Use IP Address Lists

Popular websites publish their IP address information, which is accessible through standard web searches. If you want the IP address for Facebook, for example, you can find it online with a simple search.

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