IP address regex Python

IP address

The regular expressions below can be used to validate if a string is a valid IP address format and to extract an IP address from a string. Please note that this validation can not tell if an IP address actually exists.

IPv4 (192.168.0.1) regex

A simple regular expression to validate string against a valid IPv4 format:

"^(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)$"

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Example code in Python:

import re

# Validate IPv4 address
ipv4_pattern = "^(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)$"
re.match(ipv4_pattern, '192.168.0.1') # Returns Match object

# Extract IPv4 from a string
ipv4_extract_pattern = "(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\\.(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)"
re.findall(ipv4_extract_pattern, 'My server IP addresses are 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.0.2') # returns ['192.168.0.1', '192.168.0.2']

IPv6 regex

The IPv6 regular expression can be used to match IPv6 string or to extract IPv6 from a given string:

"^(([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){7,7}[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,7}:|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,6}:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,5}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,2}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,4}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,3}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,3}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,2}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,5}|[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:((:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,6})|:((:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,7}|:)|fe80:(:[0-9a-fA-F]{0,4}){0,4}%[0-9a-zA-Z]{1,}|::(ffff(:0{1,4}){0,1}:){0,1}((25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])\\.){3,3}(25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,4}:((25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])\\.){3,3}(25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9]))$"

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False

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Example code in Python:

import re

# Validate IPv6 address
regex = "^(([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){7,7}[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,7}:|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,6}:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,5}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,2}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,4}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,3}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,3}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,4}|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,2}(:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,5}|[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:((:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,6})|:((:[0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}){1,7}|:)|fe80:(:[0-9a-fA-F]{0,4}){0,4}%[0-9a-zA-Z]{1,}|::(ffff(:0{1,4}){0,1}:){0,1}((25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])\\.){3,3}(25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])|([0-9a-fA-F]{1,4}:){1,4}:((25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9])\\.){3,3}(25[0-5]|(2[0-4]|1{0,1}[0-9]){0,1}[0-9]))$"
re.match(regex, '1:2:3:4:5:6:7:8') # Returns Match object

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True

False

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Notes on IPv4 and IPv6 address validation

While validation of IP addresses using regex can give a possibility to check their format, it does not guarantee you that those addresses actually exist. You might need to do additional actions to verify that.