How to Find Your IP Address in Ubuntu

Knowing your IP address in Ubuntu is one of those fundamental networking tasks that comes up constantly — whether you're configuring a server, troubleshooting a connection, setting up SSH access, or just trying to understand your network. Ubuntu gives you several ways to find it, and which method works best depends on your setup, your comfort with the terminal, and whether you need a local or public-facing address.

What "IP Address" Actually Means in This Context

Before diving into methods, it's worth clarifying the distinction — because Ubuntu systems often have more than one IP address, and people frequently confuse them.

• Private (local) IP address — the address assigned to your machine within your home or office network. Typically starts with 192.168.x.x, 10.x.x.x, or 172.16.x.x. This is what other devices on the same network use to reach you.
• Public IP address — the address your internet traffic appears to come from, as seen by external servers. This is assigned by your ISP and shared across your router.
• Loopback address — always 127.0.0.1, used internally for the machine to communicate with itself. Not relevant for actual networking tasks.

Most of the time when people ask how to find their IP address in Ubuntu, they mean the private/local IP — the one used within their network.

Finding Your IP Address Using the Terminal 💻

The terminal is the fastest and most reliable route, and it works across all Ubuntu versions, including server editions with no desktop environment.

Using ip addr (Recommended)

The ip command is the modern standard for network configuration in Linux. Run: