Overview

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Below you will find instructions showing how to find the MAC address of a device.  You may need to find the MAC address of your device to register your wired device to connect to a campus workstation, register a device without a web browsers to connect to ResNet, and aid in identifying your device for troubleshooting purposes.

A MAC address, which stands for media access control address, is a sequence of values that serves as a unique identifier for your device's network adapter. Often the address is written in value pairs separated by colons, hyphens, or other characters.  Here is the general format that is used, with letter and numbers replacing the x's You may also hear this MAC address be referred to as a hardware address, physical address, WiFi address, or Ethernet address.

On this page:

• Computers
  • Windows
  • Mac
  • Linux/Unix
  • Chromebook
• Mobile Devices
  • iPhone/iPad (iOS)
  • Android
     

Critical Concepts

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• Every device that connects to the network has a unique MAC address
• If your devices has multiple methods to connect to the network, such as a wired Ethernet and wireless connection, each adapter has its own MAC address.
  
  

Steps to Take

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Computers

Windows

1. Click on the Start menu at the bottom left corner of your screen or press the Windows key.
2. In the search box, type cmd
3. Press ENTER. This should open a window that says "Command Prompt".
4. In the command prompt type the following command then press ENTER.
   

   getmac -v

5. This should print out information about the various network adapters on your device. Depending on which adapter you are using (Wireless, wired), the Physical Address under the adapter header is the device's MAC Address.
   
   

Mac

1. On top menu bar, click on Apple Icon > System Preferences... 
2. Select Network option
3. Select the type of network adapter you are looking for, then continue with the corresponding steps:
   • Wireless
     1. Select WiFi tab on the left 
     2. Click Advanced... in the bottom right corner
     3. On the next screen, look for Wi-Fi Address at the bottom.  This is the MAC address for your wireless adapter.
   • Ethernet (Wired)
     1. Select Ethernet tab on the left
     2. Click Advanced... in the bottom right corner
     3. Click Hardware tab.  Here you will see the MAC address for your wired Ethernet adapter.
        
        

Linux/Unix

In general, the following command should work to find the MAC address of your Linux/Unix device:

ifconfig -a

However, each Linux/Unis operating system is different.  If this command does not work, check the user manual.

Chromebook

1. In the bottom right, click on the time
2. Click the Wi-Fi network icon
3. Click on the Network Information (i) button in the top right of the box
4. You should see a Wi-Fi address listed in a small drop-down box.  This is the MAC address for your wireless network adapter.

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Mobile Devices

iPhone/iPad (iOS)

1. Select Settings from your home screen
2. Go to General > About
3. Scroll down and look for the Wi-Fi Address.  This is your device's MAC address for wireless network adapter.
   
   

Android

Settings menus can vary across different Android devices.  For the majority of cases, these steps should work:

1. Select Settings from the application menu
2. Go to About Device > Status
3. Scroll down and look for the Wi-Fi Address.  This is your device's MAC address for wireless network adapter.