- Free IP scanner can also display NetBIOS information: host name, workgroup, currently logged user and MAC address. The information obtained can be exported into a file as plain text file. Try this program and you will see, how easy and simple your network management can be.
- SoftPerfect Network Scanner is one the best network scanner software for checking LAN network IP addresses. It can scan all the devices with their Host Name and MAC Address which are connected to your LAN network. It can also save scanning result in XML, Text, HTML and CSV file formats.
- Angry IP Scanner. Despite being deceptively simple Angry IP Scanner does exactly what one would.
Angry IP Scanner. Angry IP Scanner is one of the most popular scanners on the web, with over 29.
Network scanning is a necessary task, but it can start off simple and rapidly become more complicated as your business gets larger. Manually finding IP addresses on your network is possible, but why do it yourself when there are so many tools to help you? Not only can network scanning tools help you find IP addresses, but they can also provide extra information for monitoring, troubleshooting, and keeping your network running efficiently.
My top choice for a network scanning tool is the SolarWinds® IP Address Manager, as it works in an intuitive and easy-to-use way while offering a broad suite of tools and functions. It’s more approachable than some of the other tools out there and has a flatter learning curve for figuring out how to get started.
How to Find IP Addresses of Devices on My Network
Curious how to find IP addresses on-network? You may need to know about either static or dynamic IP addresses. If you can access your router, you may be able to simply view the client lists and get information like hostname and MAC address. Or you can use a device connected to the network to ping the network and view the ARP tables. Done manually in this way, you have to do everything through the command line. Use the prompt “ipconfig” on Windows to get network settings, followed by “arp -a” to view IPs plus MAC addresses.
However, this method doesn’t work across subnets. This means that if you have multiple subnets on your network, you have to go through each individual router or subnet to determine the IP addresses within the subnet. It becomes pretty clear as your network scales, manually scanning for IP addresses becomes an extremely complex task. Multiple subnets and an ever-changing string of devices connecting to and disconnecting from the network becomes problematic.
Instead of attempting to manually manage these aspects of your network, I recommend using an IP address manager (IPAM). These tools help you to manage your IP addresses and troubleshoot problems, but they also help you to find all the IP addresses of the devices on your network and determine the status of each one (dynamic, static, available, reserved, etc.). Some tools will also integrate with DNS and DHCP, and all of them will usually present data in a visual, interactive format. Many also allow you to save your network scanning results and present them in spreadsheets or reports.
Best Network Scanner Tools 2020
SolarWinds IP Address Manager
This is my top choice for network scanning software. The SolarWinds IP Address Manager (IPAM) with its IP Address Scanner feature is great for both beginner users and small businesses, and expert network administrators and large enterprises. With automated IP address tracking and integrated DHCP and DNS management, you can quite easily monitor your IP addresses and associated network information.
You can also see all your subnets and how they are structured, and which subnets and scopes don’t have much free space remaining. It allows you to flag capacity issues before they become a problem so that IP address issues don’t affect performance. I’ve also found it’s easy to find unused IPs and reclaim them to tidy up my networks.
This IPAM uses a clean and simple interface, without a steep learning curve like some other IP address managers. You can easily assign management or control permissions to other admins or admin groups, allowing you to delegate tasks simply within the IPAM rather than needing to use another tool. The console is centralized, allowing you to see all the relevant information in one place, reducing the potential for error.
I consider the SolarWinds IPAM to be a complete solution, and it’s my choice for an all-round lightweight tool you can use to scan and maintain your network. There’s a free trial available so you can try it out, then level up to gain access to more features and greater scalability.
MyLanViewer
This is another strong business-level contender for network scanner tools. MyLanViewer is an IP and network scanner, as well as a traceroute tool and network monitor. It uses a buddy-list style window to display all of your network computers, including important technical information about each one. It can scan your network to monitor IPs and let you know when any details change. It also supports remote shutdown and other remote functions for each network computer. It can monitor hidden devices on your subnets and discover bottlenecks in your connection with its traceroute tool. I’d say this is a fine choice for business use—it has an easy-to-use interface and is suitable for beginners and advanced users.
Angry IP Scanner
Looking for one of the best free tools? This is an open-source and free network scanning tool, with the ability to scan ports and IP addresses quickly and efficiently. The tool provides a report of data on each device on the network, including NetBIOS, MAC and IP address, computer name, and hostname. Keep in mind that open-source tools do require a bit more know-how on the user’s part and aren’t my usual pick for business use.
Scan Ip Mac Terminal
Angry IP Scanner can also produce reports in XML, CSV, and TXT format, which is useful for exporting data and other things within your business. Its unique feature is it uses a multi-threaded scanning approach, which uses a separate scanning thread for each IP address. This helps to improve the scanning process and make it more accurate.
Picking the Best IP Scanner
When I want to discover IP addresses on my network or scan for data generally, I tend to lean toward using a network scanning tool rather than trying to do it manually. Many network scanners have simple interfaces, and some go above and beyond in terms of ease-of-use and clean interface appearance. I like using the SolarWinds IP Address Manager, as it contains a pretty hefty solution in a lightweight package, with a free trial for people who want to try it out without commitment.
Recommended Reading
Ultimate Guide to Network Monitoring: If you’re looking for more in-depth information on how to monitor and look after your network, take a look here for a beginner’s guide followed by more expert-level instructions.
Doing a Network Reconnaissance helps network managers improve security by identifying weak devices that can be potentially breached. It can also allow managers to maintain a detailed and updated diagram of the network.
The network reconnaissance is basically identifying live hosts and scanning ports and services. When testing security or even hacking, port scanning becomes one of the most essential steps of a successful network exploration.
It basically helps identify open and vulnerable ports and protocols that are being used in the network. Port Scanning helps managers, testers, and hackers create a profile and gain intelligence about a target organization all while ensuring Access to critical Systems and services are managed correctly.
Live open ports can lead into the services running on hosts which can become a door into the organization. Running a port/services scan can make you aware of these weaknesses. With this information in hand, a network manager can secure a firewall by closing unnecessary ports and services.
The following is a list of the Best FREE IP Scanners for Port and Services, including a brief description, their features and official download site.
Here's a List of Best Free IP & Port Scanners of 2019:
There are a variety of scanners on the market which are usually online tools. But the best scanners are the ones that you run on your own devices since they allow more flexibility in the process.
1. SolarWinds Port Scanner
SolarWinds is one of the leading companies that create network and IT infrastructure monitoring software. The SolarWinds Port Scanner is one of the “Free Download” tools that allows you to scan an IP address range or hostname and generate lists of the open, closed and filtered ports on the target network.
The software is easy to use. To begin scanning you will only configure the scan profile. To do this you must enter the target information, such as IP range, hostnames. You can also configure it to look for layer 4 ports or services such as TCP or UDP ports.
Aside from the common IP and Port scanning, SolarWinds Port Scanner can also be configured to resolve hostname with specific DNS information and it can also find the MAC address to identify the OS version.
Common features?
- Uses multi-threading for less overhead and faster scanning.
- Schedule scans to ensure updated data.
- All scan profiles are configured in a single window with a command line.
- Save all scan profiles for future faster scanning.
- View all the IANA port name definitions right on the application.
Official site and where to download:
2. Nmap
Nmap is considered the Swiss Army Knife of hackers (ethical and not) and pen-testers.
Nmap stands for Network Mapper and is one of the most popular port scanners. It is an open source tool that offers a great deal of flexibility and power when it comes to performing any kind of active network reconnaissance against a target. With Nmap you can craft packets and send them to a specific target and let the software analyze the response.
For beginners, Nmap can be a little bit intimidating because there are so many different scanning combinations that get you different results.
A very short list of what you can do with Nmap:
- Scan a target selection, such a single IP, a host-name, a range, etc.
- Scan a port selection, such as a single port or a range.
- Detect specific services and OSs.
- Perform NSE scripts.
- A really strong feature in Nmap is different “Port Scan Types”, such as TCP Connect, TCP SYN Scan. Below is a table with the most common TCP Scans Types that you can do in Nmap.
Scan Type | Description |
TCP Connect (-sT) | Full Three-way-handshake (SYN, SYN/ACK, ACK) |
TCP SYN (sS) | Send SYN. RST/ACK response=not listening SYN/ACK=listening |
TCP FIN (sF) | Send FIN, RST response=port close |
TCP Xmas Tree (sX) | Send FIN, URG, PSH, RST response=port closed |
TCP Null (sN) | No Flags. RST response=port closed |
TCP ACK (PT) | Send ACK. Firewall test to verify packet filtering. |
Official site and where to download:
3. Advanced IP Scanner
It is a portable, easy-to-use and free network scanner for Windows. Advanced IP Scanner is free of installation. Just press play and you’ll have one of the most robust scanners at your disposal. With Advanced IP Scanner you can see a list of network devices with information such as IP, Port, Manufacturer, MAC Address, OS, etc.
This scanner finds all the devices in a targeted scan in a matter of seconds and provides easy access to their shared resources, either through HTTP, HTTPS, FTP or even shared folders.
Another cool feature of this tool is that it detects the RDPs or Radmin ports, and it will let you manage the device remotely right from the platform.
Common features:
- Easy access to network shares.
- Control devices via Radmin and RDP.
- Switch on/off computers remotely.
- Find the MAC addresses.
- Export all scan results to a CSV file.
Official site and where to download:
4. Angry IP Scanner
Angry IP Scanner (also called ipscan) is a free and open-source network scanner. The tool works on popular OSs, such as Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux. It was designed with simplicity in mind, the software is ultra-light, no installation is required (highly portable) and it is fairly easy to use.
At its most basic level, Angry IP Scanner will ping the target device/network to confirm that it is alive. It can also resolve hostnames, find the MAC address, and scan ports. You can extend the amount of information received about each target with the help of plugins.
Common features:
- Can scan private or a public range of IP addresses. Additionally, it can get the NetBIOS information of a device, detect web servers and customize openers.
- It is able to export the results in different formats such as TXT, CSV, XML, or IP-Port list files.
- For faster scanning, the tool uses the multi-threading approach.
- By default, the tool comes with common fetchers like Ping, Host-name, and Ports but you can add more fetchers with the help of plug-ins to see more information.
- The tool runs on the GUI, but you can use the CLI to call up different options on the software.
Official site and where to download?
5. Free IP Scanner by Eusing
Eusing Software creates miscellaneous free applications for windows users. Among the most popular tools is the Free IP Scanner. This tool is a lightweight standalone scanner which can check a hundred devices per second. It is only supported by Windows OSs.
Free IP Scanner pings the IP (or range of IPs) to see who is alive. It can also translate the host-name to IP (or vice versa), find closed and open ports and get NetBIOS information. The last one can show details such as host-name, workgroup, active logged users, and the MAC address of the device. All the results obtained can be exported into a TXT file.
People like Free IP Scanner because it is simple, portable and easy to use. However, it cannot be extended with more functionality. Although the tool scans and finds ports, the entire layer 4 TCP/UDP information cannot be customized for deeper analysis.
Extra features:
- Fast scanning using multi-threaded technology.
- Free IP Scanner can scan multiple targets per second without consuming many resources.
Official site and where to download?
6. NetCat
A fully versatile tool preferred by most hackers like NMAP above.
NetCat is not strictly an IP Scanner, it goes well beyond that. It is however a tiny Unix networking analyzer utility used by and against hackers for a large number of reasons.
It is tiny but powerful. NetCat is considered as a feature-rich networking tool used especially for debugging and investigation.
With NetCat you can create any kind of connection. It basically writes to and reads data from network connections using TCP or UDP. In other words, it can open TCP or UDP connections between two devices over any port.
The most common use for this tool is to set up reverse and bind shells, redirecting network traffic, port scanning and forwarding, debugging scripts, and service banner grabbing.
Some features?
- Connect to a remote system through any port or service.
- Banner Grabbing to identify the software that the target is using.
- Scan, listen and forward open ports.
- Create tunnels with specific network parameters, like source port/interface, listening port/interface and the remote host.
- Create back-doors for easy access to the target.
- Transfer files from the target
Official site and where to download:
7. LanSweeper IP Scanner
It is a free and powerful IT management tool that can scan networks and find your assets. The IP Scanner is a feature that comes integrated with LanSweeper. With the scanner, you can target a specific IP or range of IPs and get a full inventory of all computers, servers, virtual servers, switches, routers, printers, VoIP phones, etc. The results can be easily exported and created into a report.
People love LanSweeper because of its ability to automatically deploy scripts and commands to many devices at the same time. It uses an integrated deployment feature to automatically deploy software and execute commands on the devices shown on the inventory.
The software goes beyond scanning. It will let you get deep details through scanning, find issues and proactively fix them. The scanner grabs network information through WMI, SNMP, HTTP, FTP, SSH and other protocols.
Scan Network For Ip Using Mac Address
Common features?
- Inventorying
- Scan IP addresses automatically or on demand
- Import the results via a CSV file.
- Run custom actions such as remote shutdown.
- Wake-On-LAN Manager
- Find MAC address, logged-on users, user accounts, device up-times, etc.
- The free version lets you find detailed info of up to 100 devices.
Official Site and where to download?
8. MyLanViewer Network/IP Scanner
A comprehensive network IP Scanner for Windows OSs. On the basic level, this tool will scan the target network and will show the IP, MAC addresses, NIC vendor, OS Version, logged users, and shared folders of the wired and wireless devices found an easy-to-read list.
MyLANViewer Network/IP Scanner can monitor all the scanned devices (even if they are hidden), and notify you when a new device was found.
Additional Features:
- NetBIOS scanner
- Whois and Traceroute tool
- Remote shutdown and Wake-On-LAN manager.
- Wireless network scanner and monitor
- Show and access shared folders
- Terminate user sessions
- Show netstat information
- Find rogue DHCP servers.
Official Site and where to download:
9. Slitheris Network Discovery
Slitheris Network Discovery from Komodo Laboratories is a Windows-based premium IP scanner. The free version of this advanced network scanner allows you to find up to 50 network devices but can be extended with the premium license.
This tool takes IP scanning to a new level, it is fast and finds information that most scanners can’t. It gathers information from target network devices without needed credentials or agents. Slitheris Network Discovery uses multi-threaded technology to quickly find all pingable devices and uses ARP pings to discover hidden devices.
What can Slitheris do?
- Real-time visual ping sweep. It shows what the ping sweep is doing with a visual matrix.
- OS Detection and Fingerprinting. Identify different Windows OS versions without the need for authentication and credentials.
- Identify different type of devices. Find whether the device is a Printer, Virtual Machine, Mobile, Server, Workstation, etc.
- Age determination. Uses MAC address to determine the age of the device.
- SMB Security. Alarms when SMB (Server Message Block) is enabled or disabled on a device, to improve security.
- Detects stealth devices. The tool uses the ARP cache to find un-pingable devices.
- Find Web GUI access devices. The tool uses port scanning on HTTP and HTTPS to see whether a device can be accessed through Web GUI.
Official Site and where to download:
Ip Scan For Mac
Conclusion
Open ports can be gateways into networks and are considered weaknesses if not treated with security in mind.
The toolbox of network and security administrators should contain a Port and Services Scanner to help them identify open ports and control vulnerabilities efficiently, before its too late.
There are many free and online scanners out there as well, But when combining portability, effectiveness, feature-richness, flexibility and cost efficiency, only the previous nine stand out.
Ip Scan Tool For Mac
They are free, download a copy today and scan your network. We suggest you grab several of them (as they are all Free) and give them a try – they all have different feature sets and work well when there is no internet connection available to use an online variation. We hope this list of some of the top Port Scanners help you secure your network and keep intruders out!