How to change Mac address on macOS

You may have heard the term “MAC address” mentioned in passing. But what is a Mac address? It is a media access control address, meaning it is a unique identifier for network interfaces that deal with a network segment. MAC addresses are assigned by a manufacturer to the network interface controller and are stored in the hardware.

Basically, a MAC address comes connected with your computer’s network adapter hardware. There may be times when your MAC address may cause problems connecting to the Internet. For example, you may have updated your device’s hardware and need to register the new MAC address with your ISP. A simpler solution would be to update your MAC address.

This article will teach you how to change your MAC address on a macOS device and answer some of your frequently asked questions.

Find your Mac address

First, you will need to find the Mac address associated with the network card installed on your Mac computer. There are several ways to find the MAC address of your Mac, but we will show you the easiest ones. Remember that you may want to make a note of your assigned MAC address if you need it.

Here’s how to find your Mac address on a macOS device:

The easiest way to find your MAC address is to use the keyboard shortcut Control+Click on the WiFI icon in the top right corner of your Mac.

As you can see, the MAC address appears in the drop-down menu. Another option to see your MAC address is to go to Network Settings. Here’s how to find it:

1. Click the Apple icon in the top left corner of your Mac. Then, click System preferences.
   
2. Click on Grid.
   
3. Click Advanced.
   
4. Take note of your MAC address.
   

Since most Mac addresses are permanent, you can trick or “spoof” a Mac address that is reported from an operating system. This could be useful when connecting to a public Wi-Fi hotspot for privacy reasons.

Change your Mac address

To change your MAC address, you’ll need to open the Terminal app from your dock (if that’s where you are) or through the Mac Finder.

To open Terminal from Finder, do this:

1. Open Finder on your Mac and click Applications.
   
2. Then double click Utilities.
   
3. Double click Terminal.
   
4. The terminal will start up and you can start the process of changing your MAC address.
   

1. Once you have opened the Terminal app, type this in the terminal:
   openssl rand –hex6 | sed ‘s/(..)/1:/g; s/.$//’ | xargs sudo ifconfig en0 ether
2. You will now see a hexadecimal number that looks like this: 1a:22:a1:a1:aa:a1. Disconnect your Mac from the Internet.
3. Now, type this in the terminal:
   sudo ifconfig en0 ether xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx

   The x’s represent the new Mac address created above.

The Mac address returns to the default when you restart your Mac computer. So whenever you need or want to change your Mac address in macOS, you’ll type one of the above commands in the Terminal app and you’ll be good to go.

After changing your Mac address, you’ll probably also want to restart your Wi-Fi connection to avoid network issues.

Frequent questions

Here are more answers to your questions about MAC addresses.

Should I change my MAC address?

The answer to this depends on the user. There are many good reasons to change your MAC address. If you want to increase your privacy on a local network, connect to a network that only allows certain devices, or upgrade your devices’ hardware, changing your MAC address may be a good idea.

However, if you are not tech-savvy or are having difficulty following the steps above, it may be a good idea to seek further help before changing your MAC address.

I changed my MAC address and now I’m having connection problems. What is happening and how do I fix it?

Sometimes users will have problems connecting to the Internet after changing the MAC address. The first thing you’ll want to do is restart your router and try connecting again. Most of the time, this will fix any connection issues.

Next, you must turn off your Mac and turn it on again. A reboot of the device will revert its MAC address to that assigned by the manufacturer. Your connection problems should be resolved with a reboot, but you will have to try the steps above to change your MAC address.

So now you know how to find out what your Mac address is and how to change it from macOS, whether for personal privacy reasons or simply because you now have the information and personal steps you need to do so.