IP Addressing and Subnetting

IP addressing is the system that assigns a unique identifier to every device on a network. Subnetting is the practice of dividing a large network into smaller, more manageable sub-networks. These concepts are fundamental to network design and administration.

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IPv4 Addressing

An IPv4 address is a 32-bit number, typically written in dotted decimal notation as four octets:

192.168.1.100

Binary:  11000000.10101000.00000001.01100100

Each octet can range from 0 to 255 (8 bits each).

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Network and Host Portions

Every IP address has two parts:

Part	Purpose
Network portion	Identifies which network the device belongs to
Host portion	Identifies the specific device on that network

The subnet mask determines where the network portion ends and the host portion begins.

Subnet Mask Examples