What is My Public IP Address

Internet Protocol addresses are similar to house addresses or cell phone numbers. There are two systems in use version 4 and version 6. While version 4 is similar to a home address where multiple people share the same address, version 6 is more similar to a phone number where you reach a specific person, not a household. 

The most simple method of finding out your public IP address is to open Terminal or Command prompt and enter these commands. 

curl -4 ifconfig.me will return your version 4 address. 

┌[ forthright@macOS ] ~
└➤ curl -4 ifconfig.me
11.222.3.44%    

curl -6 ifconfig.me will return your version 6 address.

┌[ forthright@macOS ] ~
└➤ curl -6 ifconfig.me
2600:1:2:3:4:5:6:7%

A version 4 address will have four decimal numbers separated by periods and range from 0 to 255. 

A version 6 address will have eight hexadecimal numbers separated by colons and range from 0 to FFFF.