How to change your IP address (4 ways)

Your IP address is the identifier your connection shows to every site you visit. There are plenty of reasons to change it — privacy, getting around a block, appearing in another location, or shaking off a bad reputation that’s causing CAPTCHAs. Here are four ways to do it, from instant to involved.

1. Use a VPN (the easy, instant way)

By far the simplest method: connect to a VPN and your IP instantly becomes the server’s, in whatever country you choose. It’s immediate, reversible, works on every device, and — unlike the other methods — it also encrypts your traffic for privacy. For most people wanting to change their IP, this is the answer. You can pick from locations worldwide on our servers page.

2. Restart your router

Many home connections use a dynamic IP that your provider changes periodically. Turning your router off for a few minutes and back on sometimes forces a new one. It’s free but unreliable — you might get the same address back — and it only changes your home IP, with no privacy benefit.

3. Switch networks

Moving from Wi-Fi to mobile data, or connecting to a different network, gives you a different IP because it’s a different connection entirely. Useful in a pinch to see if a block is tied to your specific address, but not a controllable or private solution.

4. Ask your ISP (or get a dedicated IP)

You can sometimes ask your provider to change your IP, though it’s slow and manual. At the other end, if your problem is a shared address with a bad reputation, a dedicated IP gives you a clean, consistent address that’s yours alone — the opposite approach, but the right one for constant CAPTCHAs and blocks.

Which should you use?

For privacy, access to other regions, or an instant clean IP, use a VPN — it’s the only method that also protects you. The others are situational fixes. Curious what your current IP reveals? Our Privacy Check shows it, along with the location and details it gives away.