Computing & Communications Center
Network Operations

Finding your Hardware MAC Address

Windows 7 and Windows Vista

While the ipconfig command will work on Windows Vista and Windows 7, the output is substantially longer than in previous versions of Windows, making it much more difficult to find the relevant information. Instead, we recommend using the getmac command.

  1. Click on the Start menu button.
  2. Type cmd in the search box and press Enter. This will open a black Command Prompt window.
  3. Type getmac /v /fo list
  4. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled Local Area Connection for wired interfaces or Wireless Network Connection for wireless interfaces.
  5. The value listed as the Physical Address is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. It will be in the format XX-XX-XX-XX-XX-XX.

  6. Type exit to close the Command Prompt window.

Windows XP, Windows 2000, and Windows NT

  1. Click on the Start menu button.
  2. Click on the Run item in the menu.
  3. Type cmd in the Open: box and press Enter. This will open a black Command Prompt window.
  4. Type ipconfig /all
  5. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection for wired interfaces or Ethernet adapter Wireless Network Connection for wireless interfaces.
  6. The value listed as the Physical Address is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. It will be in the format XX-XX-XX-XX-XX-XX.

  7. Type exit to close the Command Prompt window.

Apple Mac OS X

  1. From the Apple Menu, open System Preferences....
  2. In the Internet & Wireless (Internet & Network in older versions) section, select the Network control panel.
  3. Select the desired network device in the list. This will typically be Ethernet for the wired Ethernet port or AirPort for the wireless network.
  4. Click the Advanced... button in the lower right corner.
  5. Select the Ethernet or AirPort tab as appropriate.
  6. The value listed beside Ethernet ID: or AirPort ID: is the Hardware MAC Address for the selected network device. It will be in the format XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX.

Apple iPhone

  1. From the main screen, select Settings.
  2. Select General.
  3. Select About.
  4. The Hardware MAC Address will be identified as Wi-Fi Address in the list of settings.

Android

  1. From the Home screen, press the menu key or icon and select Settings.
  2. Select About Phone or About Device.
  3. Select Status.
  4. The Hardware MAC Address will be identified as Wi-Fi MAC Address in the list.

GNU/Linux

  1. Open a Terminal.
  2. Type /sbin/ifconfig -a
  3. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled eth0 for wired Ethernet interfaces or wlan0 for wireless interfaces.
    4. $ /sbin/ifconfig -a
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:60:08:C4:99:AA
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:15647904 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          TX packets:69559 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          Interrupt:10 Base address:0x300
  4. The value listed next to HWaddr is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. It will be in the format XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX as seen above.

  5. Type exit to close the Terminal window.

FreeBSD

  1. From the shell, type /sbin/ifconfig -a
  2. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled bge0 or fxp0 for wired Ethernet interfaces.
    3. bge0: flags=8943 metric 0 mtu 1500
	options=c0099<RXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,VLAN_HWCSUM,VLAN_HWTSO,LINKSTATE>
	ether 2c:76:8a:ad:e6:47
	media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex,flowcontrol,rxpause,txpause>)
	status: active
  3. The value listed next to ether is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. It will be in the format XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX as seen above.

Windows Millenium Edition, Windows 98, and Windows 95

  1. Click on the Start menu button.
  2. Click on the Run item in the menu.
  3. Type winipcfg in the Open: box and press Enter.
  4. Once the program runs, select your Ethernet card from the drop down box. Make sure you do not select PPP Adapter, Dial-Up Adapter, or AOL Adapter--those entries are not for your Ethernet card.
  5. After you select your Ethernet card, look for a box marked Adapter Address. This is your Hardware MAC Address.

Apple Macintosh with Open Transport

  1. Open the TCP/IP control panel.
  2. Select Info from the main control panel.
  3. The Hardware MAC Address is displayed as the Hardware Address.

Apple Macintosh with MacTCP

  1. Open the MacTCP control panel.
  2. You should see an icon labeled Ethernet. Hold down the Option key and click this icon.
  3. Your Hardware MAC Address should appear beneath the icon.

Solaris/SunOS

  1. From the shell, type /sbin/ifconfig -a
  2. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled le0, ie0, or hme0. 
    # /sbin/ifconfig -a
le0: flags=863<UP,BROADCAST,NOTRAILERS,RUNNING,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
        inet 131.225.80.209 netmask fffff800 broadcast 131.225.87.255
        ether 8:0:20:10:d2:ae
  3. The value listed next to ether is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. Solaris and SunOS strip off the leading 0 commonly included in the MAC address. In the case of this machine, the Hardware MAC address is 08:00:20:10:d2:ae.

Hewlett-Packard HP/UX

  1. From the shell, type lanscan
  2. Find the entry associated with your network card, typically labeled lan0. 
    $ lanscan
Hardware Station        Dev Hardware Net-Interface   NM  Encapsulation      Mjr
Path     Address        lu  State    NameUnit State  ID  Methods            Num
2.0.2    0x08000935C99D 0   UP       lan0     UP     4   ETHER              52
  3. The value listed below Station Address is the Hardware MAC Address for that network card. HP systems remove the :'s from the MAC address. In the case of this system, the Hardware MAC Address is 08:00:09:35:C9:9D.
Maintained by webmaster@wpi.edu
Last modified: Sep 07, 2012, 17:38 EDT
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