Classful IPv4 Addressing

There are more than 4.2 billion IP addresses in IPv4; this enormous number needs to be organized to be used for various network requirements. In this lesson, we’ll examine the IPv4 address space and see how it is further divided into smaller address spaces using classful addressing.

Classful IPv4 addressing

It’s essential to understand an IP address’s components before looking at classful IPv4 addressing.

The network and host parts are the components that make up an IP address. Multiple devices can be connected to a network, and both of these components help identify the network and devices.

Network part

The network part specifies a unique number assigned to the whole network and is responsible for identifying the network to which a particular device belongs. For example, suppose 100 servers are operating within a shared business network. In this case, all devices should have the same network portion for their IP addresses, indicating that all devices belong to a particular network.

Host part

The host part comes after the network part in an IP address and denotes the unique number assigned to a host or device connected to the network. For instance, each of the 100 servers would have a different and unique host part designating a distinct IP address in the business network.