Check your MAC address on Linux
Display the hardware address of every network interface.
01Command
$ ip link show | grep -E '^[0-9]+:|link/ether'02What it does
Every network card has a fixed hardware MAC address like 3c:7a:8f:12:ab:cd, shown in the link/ether line of ip link output. This is the address a router sees when your machine joins the network, which matters for MAC filtering or DHCP reservations. Look at the interface name first (wlan0/wlp2s0 for Wi-Fi, enp*/eth0 for Ethernet), then read its address.
03Risk
04Undo
✓No undo needed — this command does not change persistent state.
05Sources
- ip-link(8) — Linux manual pageEvidence: ip link show displays network interfaces including their hardware (MAC) address in the link/ether field.
Last verified: 2026-09-18 · Category: Network
06Related solutions
One command that prints every interface with its state and IPv4/IPv6 addresses in a short table — the modern, memorable replacement for digging through `ifconfig` or the verbose `ip addr` output.
The routing table is the first thing to check when traffic leaves the wrong interface or the gateway seems dead — and `ip route show` is the quick, modern way to read it.
The classic forgotten-syntax command: `traceroute` shows every router between you and a destination plus the round-trip time of probes to each hop.