Windows - Displaying, Releasing, and Renewing a DHCP Lease

This document outlines how to see your current IP address and MAC address as well as how to release and renew a DHCP lease.

Releasing and renewing your DHCP lease will pull a new IP address for your device from the DHCP host. This can solve many network connection issues.

Note: Releasing and renewing the current configuration can only be done if your adapter is configured to obtain an IP address automatically.

Displaying a DHCP Lease

  1. Open the Start menu.
  2. Type "cmd" into the search bar.
  3. Either click Command Prompt (or press Enter once the Command Prompt listing is highlighted).
  4. In the Command Prompt, type "ipconfig /all," and press Enter. Your IP Address is listed to the right of IPv4 Address while your MAC Address is listed to the right of Physical Address.

    IP Address and MAC Address locations

Releasing and Renewing a DHCP Lease

  1. Open the Start menu.
  2. Type "cmd" into the search bar, and click Command Prompt (or press Enter once the Command Prompt listing is highlighted).

    Type cmd in start menu

  3. In the Command Prompt, type "ipconfig /release," and press Enter.

    Windows IP Configuration screen

  4. Then type "ipconfig /renew," and press Enter. Note: There is supposed to be a space between "ipconfig" and "/renew."

    Final screen before renewal

You have renewed your DHCP lease.


Keywords:
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Doc ID:
562
Owned by:
Help Desk KB Team in DoIT Help Desk
Created:
1999-12-31
Updated:
2026-07-06
Sites:
DoIT Help Desk