IP Address Subnetting Tutorial

This talk will cover the basics of IP addressing and subnetting.

Topics covered will include:

• What is an IP Address?
• What are Classes?
• What is a Network Address?
• What are Subnet Masks and Subnet Addresses?
• How are Subnet Masks defined and used?
• How can all this be applied?
• What is CIDR?
• How can I get more information?

IP Addressing
An IP (Internet Protocol) address is a unique identifier for a node or host connection on
an IP network. An IP address is a 32 bit binary number usually represented as 4 decimal
values, each representing 8 bits, in the range 0 to 255 (known as octets) separated by
decimal points. This is known as "dotted decimal" notation.

Example: 140.179.220.200

It is sometimes useful to view the values in their binary form.

140 .179 .220 .200

10001100.10110011.11011100.11001000

Every IP address consists of two parts, one identifying the network and one identifying
the node. The Class of the address and the subnet mask determine which part belongs to
the network address and which part belongs to the node address.

Address Classes
There are 5 different address classes. You can determine which class any IP address is in
by examining the first 4 bits of the IP address.

• Class A addresses begin with 0xxx, or 1 to 126 decimal.

• Class B addresses begin with 10xx, or 128 to 191 decimal.
• Class C addresses begin with 110x, or 192 to 223 decimal.
• Class D addresses begin with 1110, or 224 to 239 decimal.
• Class E addresses begin with 1111, or 240 to 254 decimal.

Addresses beginning with 01111111, or 127 decimal, are reserved for loopback and for
internal testing on a local machine; [You can test this: you should always be able to ping
127.0.0.1, which points to yourself] Class D addresses are reserved for multicasting;
Class E addresses are reserved for future use. They should not be used for host addresses.
Now we can see how the Class determines, by default, which part of the IP address
belongs to the network (N, in blue) and which part belongs to the node (n, in red).

• Class A -- NNNNNNNN.nnnnnnnn.nnnnnnnn.nnnnnnnn
• Class B -- NNNNNNNN.NNNNNNNN.nnnnnnnn.nnnnnnnn
• Class C -- NNNNNNNN.NNNNNNNN.NNNNNNNN.nnnnnnnn

In the example, 140.179.220.200 is a Class B address so by default the Network part of

the address (also known as the Network Address) is defined by the first two octets
(140.179.x.x) and the node part is defined by the last 2 octets (x.x.220.200).

In order to specify the network address for a given IP address, the node section is set to
all "0"s. In our example, 140.179.0.0 specifies the network address for 140.179.220.200.
When the node section is set to all "1"s, it specifies a broadcast that is sent to all hosts on
the network. 140.179.255.255 specifies the example broadcast address. Note that this is
true regardless of the length of the node section.

Private Subnets

There are three IP network addresses reserved for private networks. The addresses are
10.0.0.0, Subnet Mask 255.0.0.0, 172.16.0.0, Subnet Mask 255.240.0.0, and
192.168.0.0, Subnet Mask 255.255.0.0. These addresses are also notated 10.0.0.0/8,
172.16.0.0/12, and 192.168.0.0/16; this notation will be explained later in this tutorial.
They can be used by anyone setting up internal IP networks, such as a lab or home LAN
behind a NAT or proxy server or a router. It is always safe to use these because routers on
the Internet by default will never forward packets coming from these addresses. These
addresses are defined in RFC 1918.

Subnetting
Subnetting an IP Network can be done for a variety of reasons, including organization,
use of different physical media (such as Ethernet, FDDI, WAN, etc.), preservation of
address space, and security. The most common reason is to control network traffic. In an
Ethernet network, all nodes on a segment see all the packets transmitted by all the other
nodes on that segment. Performance can be adversely affected under heavy traffic loads,
due to collisions and the resulting retransmissions. A router is used to connect IP
networks to minimize the amount of traffic each segment must receive.

Subnet Masking

Applying a subnet mask to an IP address allows you to identify the network and node
parts of the address. The network bits are represented by the 1s in the mask, and the node
bits are represented by the 0s. Performing a bitwise logical AND operation between the
IP address and the subnet mask results in the Network Address or Number.
For example, using our test IP address and the default Class B subnet mask, we get:
10001100.10110011.11110000.11001000 140.179.240.200 Class B IP
Address
11111111.11111111.00000000.00000000 255.255.000.000 Default
Class B Subnet Mask
--------------------------------------------------------
10001100.10110011.00000000.00000000 140.179.000.000 Network
Address

Default subnet masks:

• Class A - 255.0.0.0 - 11111111.00000000.00000000.00000000

• Class B - 255.255.0.0 - 11111111.11111111.00000000.00000000
• Class C - 255.255.255.0 - 11111111.11111111.11111111.00000000

More Restrictive Subnet Masks

Additional bits can be added to the default subnet mask for a given Class to further
subnet, or break down, a network. When a bitwise logical AND operation is performed
between the subnet mask and IP address, the result defines the Subnet Address (also
called the Network Address or Network Number). There are some restrictions on the
subnet address. Node addresses of all "0"s and all "1"s are reserved for specifying the
local network (when a host does not know its network address) and all hosts on the
network (broadcast address), respectively. This also applies to subnets. A subnet address
cannot be all "0"s or all "1"s. This also implies that a 1 bit subnet mask is not allowed.
This restriction is required because older standards enforced this restriction. Recent
standards that allow use of these subnets have superseded these standards, but many
"legacy" devices do not support the newer standards. If you are operating in a controlled
environment, such as a lab, you can safely use these restricted subnets.

To calculate the number of subnets or nodes, use the formula (2n-2) where n = number of
bits in either field, and 2n represents 2 raised to the nth power. Multiplying the number of
subnets by the number of nodes available per subnet gives you the total number of nodes
available for your class and subnet mask. Also, note that although subnet masks with non-
contiguous mask bits are allowed, they are not recommended.

Example:

10001100.10110011.11011100.11001000 140.179.220.200 IP Address

11111111.11111111.11100000.00000000 255.255.224.000 Subnet Mask
--------------------------------------------------------
10001100.10110011.11000000.00000000 140.179.192.000 Subnet
Address
10001100.10110011.11011111.11111111 140.179.223.255 Broadcast
Address

In this example a 3 bit subnet mask was used. There are 6 (23-2) subnets available with
this size mask (remember that subnets with all 0's and all 1's are not allowed). Each
subnet has 8190 (213-2) nodes. Each subnet can have nodes assigned to any address
between the Subnet address and the Broadcast address. This gives a total of 49,140 nodes
 for the entire class B address subnetted this way. Notice that this is less than the 65,534
nodes an unsubnetted class B address would have.

You can calculate the Subnet Address by performing a bitwise logical AND operation
between the IP address and the subnet mask, then setting all the host bits to 0s. Similarly,
you can calculate the Broadcast Address for a subnet by performing the same logical
AND between the IP address and the subnet mask, then setting all the host bits to 1s. That
is how these numbers are derived in the example above.

Subnetting always reduces the number of possible nodes for a given network. There are
complete subnet tables available here for Class A, Class B and Class C. These tables list
all the possible subnet masks for each class, along with calculations of the number of
networks, nodes and total hosts for each subnet.

An Example
Here is another, more detailed, example. Say you are assigned a Class C network number
of 200.133.175.0 (apologies to anyone who may actually own this domain address). You
want to utilize this network across multiple small groups within an organization. You can
do this by subnetting that network with a subnet address.

We will break this network into 14 subnets of 14 nodes each. This will limit us to 196
nodes on the network instead of the 254 we would have without subnetting, but gives us
the advantages of traffic isolation and security. To accomplish this, we need to use a
subnet mask 4 bits long.
Recall that the default Class C subnet mask is

255.255.255.0 (11111111.11111111.11111111.00000000 binary)

Extending this by 4 bits yields a mask of
255.255.255.240 (11111111.11111111.11111111.11110000 binary)
This gives us 16 possible network numbers, 2 of which cannot be used:
Subnet bits Network Number Node Addresses Broadcast Address
0000 200.133.175.0 Reserved None
0001 200.133.175.16 .17 thru .30 200.133.175.31
0010 200.133.175.32 .33 thru .46 200.133.175.47
0011 200.133.175.48 .49 thru .62 200.133.175.63
0100 200.133.175.64 .65 thru .78 200.133.175.79
0101 200.133.175.80 .81 thru .94 200.133.175.95
0110 200.133.175.96 .97 thru .110 200.133.175.111
0111 200.133.175.112 .113 thru .126 200.133.175.127
1000 200.133.175.128 .129 thru .142 200.133.175.143
1001 200.133.175.144 .145 thru .158 200.133.175.159
1010 200.133.175.160 .161 thru .174 200.133.175.175
1011 200.133.175.176 .177 thru .190 200.133.175.191
1100 200.133.175.192 .193 thru .206 200.133.175.207
1101 200.133.175.208 .209 thru .222 200.133.175.223
1110 200.133.175.224 .225 thru .238 200.133.175.239
1111 200.133.175.240 Reserved None

CIDR -- Classless InterDomain Routing

Now that you understand "classful" IP Subnetting principals, you can forget them ;). The
reason is CIDR -- Classless InterDomain Routing. CIDR was invented several years ago
to keep the internet from running out of IP addresses. The "classful" system of allocating
IP addresses can be very wasteful; anyone who could reasonably show a need for more
that 254 host addresses was given a Class B address block of 65533 host addresses. Even
more wasteful were companies and organizations that were allocated Class A address
blocks, which contain over 16 Million host addresses! Only a tiny percentage of the
allocated Class A and Class B address space has ever been actually assigned to a host
computer on the Internet.

People realized that addresses could be conserved if the class system was eliminated. By
accurately allocating only the amount of address space that was actually needed, the
address space crisis could be avoided for many years. This was first proposed in 1992 as
a scheme called Supernetting. Under supernetting, the classful subnet masks are
extended so that a network address and subnet mask could, for example, specify multiple
Class C subnets with one address. For example, if I needed about 1000 addresses, I could
supernet 4 Class C networks together:

192.60.128.0 (11000000.00111100.10000000.00000000) Class C subnet

address
192.60.129.0 (11000000.00111100.10000001.00000000) Class C subnet
address
192.60.130.0 (11000000.00111100.10000010.00000000) Class C subnet
address
192.60.131.0 (11000000.00111100.10000011.00000000) Class C subnet
address
--------------------------------------------------------
192.60.128.0 (11000000.00111100.10000000.00000000) Supernetted
Subnet address
255.255.252.0 (11111111.11111111.11111100.00000000) Subnet Mask
192.60.131.255 (11000000.00111100.10000011.11111111) Broadcast address
In this example, the subnet 192.60.128.0 includes all the addresses from 192.60.128.0 to
192.60.131.255. As you can see in the binary representation of the subnet mask, the
Network portion of the address is 22 bits long, and the host portion is 10 bits long.

Under CIDR, the subnet mask notation is reduced to a simplified shorthand. Instead of
spelling out the bits of the subnet mask, it is simply listed as the number of 1s bits that
start the mask. In the above example, instead of writing the address and subnet mask as

192.60.128.0, Subnet Mask 255.255.252.0

The network address would be written simply as:
192.60.128.0/22
Which indicates starting address of the network, and number of 1s bits (22) in the
network portion of the address. If you look at the subnet mask in binary
(11111111.11111111.11111100.00000000), you can easily see how this notation works.

The use of a CIDR notated address is the same as for a Classful address. Classful
addresses can easily be written in CIDR notation (Class A = /8, Class B = /16, and Class
C = /24)

It is currently almost impossible for an individual or company to be allocated their own

IP address blocks. You will simply be told to get them from your ISP. The reason for this
is the ever-growing size of the internet routing table. Just 10 years ago, there were less
than 5000 network routes in the entire Internet. Today, there are over 100,000. Using
CIDR, the biggest ISPs are allocated large chunks of address space (usually with a subnet
mask of /19 or even smaller); the ISP's customers (often other, smaller ISPs) are then
allocated networks from the big ISP's pool. That way, all the big ISP's customers (and
their customers, and so on) are accessible via 1 network route on the Internet. But I
digress.

It is expected that CIDR will keep the Internet happily in IP addresses for the next few
years at least. After that, IPv6, with 128 bit addresses, will be needed. Under IPv6, even
sloppy address allocation would comfortably allow a billion unique IP addresses for
every person on earth! The complete and gory details of CIDR are documented in
RFC1519, which was released in September of 1993.

Allowed Class A Subnet and Host IP addresses

# bits Subnet Mask CIDR # Subnets # Hosts Nets * Hosts
2 255.192.0.0 /10 2 4194302 8388604
3 255.224.0.0 /11 6 2097150 12582900
4 255.240.0.0 /12 14 1048574 14680036
5 255.248.0.0 /13 30 524286 15728580
6 255.252.0.0 /14 62 262142 16252804
7 255.254.0.0 /15 126 131070 16514820
8 255.255.0.0 /16 254 65534 16645636
9 255.255.128.0 /17 510 32766 16710660
10 255.255.192.0 /18 1022 16382 16742404
11 255.255.224.0 /19 2046 8190 16756740
12 255.255.240.0 /20 4094 4094 16760836
13 255.255.248.0 /21 8190 2046 16756740
14 255.255.252.0 /22 16382 1022 16742404
15 255.255.254.0 /23 32766 510 16710660
16 255.255.255.0 /24 65534 254 16645636
17 255.255.255.128 /25 131070 126 16514820
18 255.255.255.192 /26 262142 62 16252804
19 255.255.255.224 /27 524286 30 15728580
20 255.255.255.240 /28 1048574 14 14680036
21 255.255.255.248 /29 2097150 6 12582900
22 255.255.255.252 /30 4194302 2 8388604

Allowed Class B Subnet and Host IP addresses

# bits Subnet Mask CIDR # Subnets # Hosts Nets * Hosts
2 255.255.192.0 /18 2 16382 32764
3 255.255.224.0 /19 6 8190 49140
4 255.255.240.0 /20 14 4094 57316
5 255.255.248.0 /21 30 2046 61380
6 255.255.252.0 /22 62 1022 63364
7 255.255.254.0 /23 126 510 64260
8 255.255.255.0 /24 254 254 64516
9 255.255.255.128 /25 510 126 64260
10 255.255.255.192 /26 1022 62 63364
11 255.255.255.224 /27 2046 30 61380
12 255.255.255.240 /28 4094 14 57316
13 255.255.255.248 /29 8190 6 49140
14 255.255.255.252 /30 16382 2 32764

Allowed Class C Subnet and Host IP addresses

# bits Subnet Mask CIDR # Subnets # Hosts Nets * Hosts
2 255.255.255.192 /26 2 62 124
3 255.255.255.224 /27 6 30 180
4 255.255.255.240 /28 14 14 196
5 255.255.255.248 /29 30 6 180
6 255.255.255.252 /30 62 2 124

Logical Operations
 This page will provide a brief review and explanation of the common logical bitwise
operations AND, OR, XOR (Exclusive OR) and NOT. Logical operations are performed
between two data bits (except for NOT). Bits can be either "1" or "0", and these
operations are essential to performing digital math operations.
In the "truth tables" below, the input bits are in bold, and the results are plain.

AND
The logical AND operation compares 2 bits and if they are both "1", then the result is "1",
otherwise, the result is "0".
0 1
0 0 0
1 0 1

OR
The logical OR operation compares 2 bits and if either or both bits are "1", then the result
is "1", otherwise, the result is "0".
0 1
0 0 1
1 1 1

XOR
The logical XOR (Exclusive OR) operation compares 2 bits and if exactly one of them is
"1" (i.e., if they are different values), then the result is "1"; otherwise (if the bits are the
same), the result is "0".
0 1
0 0 1
1 1 0

NOT
The logical NOT operation simply changes the value of a single bit. If it is a "1", the
result is "0"; if it is a "0", the result is "1". Note that this operation is different in that
instead of comparing two bits, it is acting on a single bit.
0 1
1 0

References and Sources on the Internet

Requests for Comments (RFCs):

• Overall RFC Index

• RFC 1918 - Address Allocation for Private Internets
• RFC 1219 - On the Assignment of Subnet Numbers
• RFC 950 - Internet standard subnetting procedure
• RFC 940 - Toward an Internet standard scheme for subnetting
• RFC 932 - Subnetwork addressing scheme
• RFC 917 - Internet subnets

Newsgroups of interest:

• comp.protocols.tcpip (or on Google)

• comp.protocols.tcpip.domains (or on Google)

Other Stuff:

• Protocols.com
• Internic
• Zen and the Art of the Internet
• Glossary of Internet Terms
• FindTutorials.com
• Firewall.cx
• Show My IP Address
• IP Address analyzer