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Understanding
IP Address & Subnet

IP Address & Subnet

Let’s take 10.0.0.0/8 as an example.

The address 10.0.0.0/8 comprises of two parts

  • IP address (10.0.0.0)

    the global addressing scheme used under Internet Protocol

  • Subnet or IP block (/8)

    • divide the IP addresses into small blocks/ranges.
    • The “/” notation along with the number is called prefix.

Calculation of IP range

  • The “/ " notation after the IP address can be used to calculate the IP address range that falls under that category.
  • All you have to do is subtract the prefix from the number 32 (As IP addresses is a 32 bit number). Put the result as an exponent of 2 and you will get the number of IPs in that range.

For example

  • to find the IP range of “/8” prefix, we subtract The prefix 8 from 32. The result 24 is used as an exponent of 2. Hence, the IP range you get is “2 to the power 24” i.e 16777216 IPs.
  • Thus, “10.0.0.0/8” refers to an IP block ranging from “10.0.0.0” to “10.255.255.255”.