How To Find Your Default Gateway IP Address (2021)

Trouble Finding your default gateway IP address in Windows 10, 8, 7, Vista, and XP?

When you are on a call with a customer care representative for your fidgety internet connection, you might get this question: “What’s the IP address of your default gateway”.

Not just that – you also require it for something as simple as accessing the Router Configuration page. As easy as it may sound, people are often in a fix when asked about this small piece of information.

What Is The Default Gateway IP?

The Default Gateway is simply the device (can be the router) that allows computers connected to it to communicate with the outside network. The private IP address given to the router is what we’re after.

How much time does it take to find the Default Gateway IP? What’s the procedure?

In case your computer is running a Windows Distribution, we have two methods to get the required information:

1. Through the Control Panel (GUI) – little under 5 minutes
2. Through the Command Prompt(CLI) – under2 minutes
For machines running on Linux andmacOSoperating systems, there’s a quick guide that we’ll discuss at the end of the article.

Note: Before we begin, it’s important to understand that this article is for home or small-scale networks using a single router. A larger network with multiple routers or hubs requires a more elaborate procedure to get the job done.

So, let’s look at the step-by-step guide to find the Default Gateway IP address from your computer:

Through the Control Panel:

1. From the Start Menu, open the Control Panel.

a. Pro-Tip: For users with Windows 8, Windows 8.1 or Windows 10, you can simply press Win + X, which will trigger the Power User menu (has different rudimentary options related to Power management, Devices, and Drivers, etcetera). From here, select Network Connections, and skip to Step 5 below.

2. Once inside the Control Panel, locate the Network and Internet option and open it.

In Windows XP, it’s called Network and Internet Connections.

In certain cases, the view in Control Panel might be set to small icons, large icons or the Classic View. This will result in the option not appearing by the above-mentioned name.

In that case, you can either change the view or simply open the Network and Sharing Center (and skip to Step 4). If you’re on Windows XP, Network Connections is the right option to go ahead with. (and skip to step 5)

3. You’ve opened the Network and Internet Window. Now:

a. If you’re on Windows Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 or 10, select the Network and Sharing Center option.

b. If you’re on Windows XP, locate and choose the Network Connections option (and skip to step 5).

4. Now you’re inside the Network and Sharing window. On the left margin, look for the option that says:

a. Change Adapter Settings, if you’re on Windows 7, 8, 8.1 or 10.

b. Manage Network Connections, if it’s Windows Vista.

c. Note: Even though the option is named Change, fret not, for we won’t actually be changing any settings in the due course of this guide. The only intent here is to see and observe the already set configuration.

5. Inside the Network Connections window, zero down on the connection that you wish to know the Default Gateway IP for.

Pro-tip: Windows might have listed down multiple available connections here, and this might make it a bit confusing. Note that any connections that say Not connected’ or Disabled’ here are out of consideration. If you still can’t identify the right connection, simply change the view here to Details’. You’ll see the same list, but this time with a Connectivity column telling you which connection is the computer actually connected to.

Note: If you are connected to a WiFi connection, then WiFi’ or Wireless Network Connection’ is what you should be looking for. Similarly, for wired it’ll say Ethernet’ or Local Area Connection’.

6. Double-click or tap on the appropriate network connection, and depending on the type of connection

(wired/wireless) you’ll see the Ethernet Status/WiFi Status dialog box come up.

Note: You may have misidentified the connection if you see any other dialog box coming up. In that case, you can go back to step 5 and try to figure out the right connection with the given instructions.

7. With the Status window open, you should click on the Details… button to move ahead. If you’re on Windows XP, you’ll first have to switch to Support tab to find the Details… button.

8. Depending on whether you are on an IPv4 or IPv6 network, look for the row that says IPv4 Default Gateway’or IPv6 Default Gateway’under the property column.

The appropriate row will have an entry resembling 192.168.1.1 in the value column.

a. This entry represents the Default Gateway IP that you’ve been looking for.

b. Note: If none of the options under Property column have any corresponding IP address, you might be looking under the wrong connection. Step 5 should be able to help you find the right one.

9. For now, you can use this value of Default gateway IP for the current connection. For future references, you can also note it down.

a. Pro-tip: When you switch from one network (router) to another, the Default Gateway IP might change.
Now let’s look at the other method for Windows, using the ipconfig command.

Through Command Prompt:

For people comfortable with using the Command Prompt, you can do the following:

1. Open the Command Prompt from the Start Menu. Alternatively, press Win + R on the keyboard, type in cmd and press the Enter key.

2. Once inside the Command Prompt window, type in ‘ipconfig’ and press enter.

3. Depending upon how many network connections are available to your computer, you’ll see a series of responses. What we’re interested in is the information under the header that represents the network you’re tapped onto.

From Step 6 above, we’ve understood what naming convention would be followed depending on whether the connection is wired or wireless in nature.

4. According to the nature of your connection, you should be looking for a response with the corresponding IPv4 or IPv6 Gateway details.

Here’s an example to elucidate on that:

When we ran the ipconfig command for our system (connected to a WiFi Hotspot), we landed up with the following information.

Wireless LAN adapter Wi-Fi:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
IPv6 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 2405:204:e48d:8458:15d6:597:9046:b51c
Temporary IPv6 Address. . . . . . : 2405:204:e48d:8458:ed5d:cd3b:1fbf:3be1
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::15d6:597:9046:b51c%3
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.43.164
 Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : fe80::8cf5:a3ff:fec0:7f83%3
192.168.43.1

Pro-tip: If you only have a single connection available to your system, you can use this command to find the right entry in a matter of seconds.

ipconfig | findstr "Default Gateway"

However, this trick will put you in a fix if you happen to have multiple connections. So, use wisely!

If you’re using Linux or Macintosh:

Using the Terminal application, you can quickly find the Default gateway IP address. On a macOS machine, open the Terminal application and type in the net stat command as follows:

netstat -nr | grep default

Similarly, if you’re working on a Linux distribution, you can use the following command in the Terminal application:

ip route | grep default

Side Note:
As we’ve mentioned above, the Default Gateway IP address will be changed if you switch to another router, or connect directly to the …