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What is an IP Range?

An IP Range is a defined group of consecutive IP addresses treated as a single block. Rather than listing individual addresses one by one, networks use ranges to organize and manage large sets of addresses efficiently. 

Every organization that operates online, from a small business to a major ISP, receives an allocation of IP addresses. Those addresses are grouped into ranges that reflect the organization’s ownership. When you look up who controls a particular address, tools like WHOIS can often return the full range associated with that network, along with contact and registration details. 

IP ranges are commonly expressed using CIDR notation, which uses a base address and a prefix length to define how many addresses the block contains. For example, a /24 block covers 256 addresses, while a /16 covers 65,536.

Ranges are used in network configuration, access control, and security filtering. Administrators can allow or block traffic from an entire range at once, making it easier to manage large volumes of addresses without applying rules to each one individually.