How to Change a Computer's Mac Address in Windows (Device Manager)

There might be a time when you want to change the MAC address of your network adapter. The MAC address (Media Access Control address) is a unique identifier which is used to identify your computer in a network. Changing it can help you diagnose network issues, or just have a little fun with a silly name. See Step 1 below to learn how to change the MAC address of your network adapter in Windows.

Method 1- Device Manager

1 Open the Device Manager. 

You can access the Device Manager from the Control Panel. It will be located in the System and Security section if you are using Category View.

2 Expand the Network Adapters section. 

In your Device Manager, you will see a list of all of the hardware installed on your computer. These are sorted into categories. Expand the Network Adapters section to see all of your installed network adapters.

• If you are not sure which adapter you are using, see Step 1 at the beginning of this article to find your device's Description.

3 Right-click on your adapter. 

Select Properties from the menu to open the network adapter's Properties window.

4 Click the Advanced tab. 

Look for the "Network Address" or "Locally Administered Address" entry. Highlight it and you will see a "Value" field on the right. Click the radio button to enable the "Value" field.

• Not all adapters can be changed this way. If you can't find either of these entries, you will need to use one of the other methods in this article.

5 Enter your new MAC address. 

MAC addresses are 12-digit values, and should be entered without any dashes or colons. For example, if you want to make the MAC address "2A:1B:4C:3D:6E:5F", you would enter "2A1B4C3D6E5F".

6 Reboot your computer to enable the changes. 

You can also disable and re-enable your adapter within Windows for the change to become effective without rebooting. Just sliding the Wi-Fi's On/Off switch like the slider found on ThinkPads and VaiOs won't satisfactorily disable/re-enable the card.

7 Check that the changes took effect. 

Once you've rebooted the computer, open the Command Prompt and enter ipconfig /all and note the Physical Address of your adapter. It should be your new MAC address.