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- How To Display Routing Table In Linux
- Using ip command
- Using netstat command
- Using route command
- Summary
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- How to View the Network Routing Table in Debian 10
- Commands covered in this article
- How to use the ip command to view network routes
- View routing table using the route command
- Use netstat command to view the routing table
- How to View the Network Routing Table in Ubuntu Linux
- How to View Routing Table?
- Method 1: Through the netstat command
- Method 2: Through the route command
- Method 3: Through the ip route command
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How To Display Routing Table In Linux
The routing table is used to show you where various different network subnets will be routed to. Here are three different commands that you can use to print out the routing table in Linux.
Using ip command
The current recommended way of printing the routing table in Linux is with the ip command followed by route, as demonstrated below.
[[email protected] ~]# ip route default via 192.168.1.254 dev eno16777736 proto static metric 100 192.168.1.0/24 dev eno16777736 proto kernel scope link src 192.168.1.14 metric 100 192.168.122.0/24 dev virbr0 proto kernel scope link src 192.168.122.1
If you’re in a hurry you can also shorten this to ‘ip r’ which will print the same output. While this is the current recommended method of printing out the routing table in Linux, you will see that the output doesn’t look as nice as older options.
Check out our IP command examples for further information on how you can use this to display networking information.
Using netstat command
While this is a popular way of printing out routing information in Linux, netstat is actually deprecated and replaced instead with ip route – it even says so in the manual page. Nevertheless as it is still widely used, we have included it here.
Netstat combined with the -r option will display the kernel routing tables. This is commonly used with the -n option, which will only show numerical addresses rather than performing any sort of name resolution.
[[email protected] ~]# netstat -rn Kernel IP routing table Destination Gateway Genmask Flags MSS Window irtt Iface 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.254 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 eno16777736 192.168.1.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 eno16777736 192.168.122.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 virbr0
Using route command
The manual page for route also states that it is obsolete and has been replaced by the ip route command previously mentioned, again as this is still used, here’s an example of it. Like netstat, the -n option is used to display numeric information only.
[[email protected] ~]# route -n Kernel IP routing table Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Iface 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.254 0.0.0.0 UG 100 0 0 eno16777736 192.168.1.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 100 0 0 eno16777736 192.168.122.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 virbr0
Summary
As we have seen there are a few ways to display the routing information in Linux, however most are now considered obsolete with ‘ip route’ being the current recommended method, despite the output in my opinion not looking as neat as the others.
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How to View the Network Routing Table in Debian 10
The process of network package routing is the transmission of an IP packet from one point to another over the network, e.g the internet. When you send an email to someone, you are actually transferring a series of IP packets or datagrams from your computer to the other network node or PC. The packets sent from your computer pass through several gateways or routers to reach the target computer system. The same approach applies to all Internet protocols such as HTTP, IRC, FTP, etc.
In all Linux and UNIX systems, the information about the forwarding of IP packets is stored in a kernel structure. These structures are called routing tables. If you want your system to communicate with other computers, you should configure these routing tables. But first, it is important how you can display these routing tables on your Linux system.
Commands covered in this article
In this article, we will explain how the routing table can be displayed in Debian using the following three popular commands
We have tested the commands from this article on a Debian 10 Buster system.
We use the Debian command line, the terminal, to execute the above commands. You can open the terminal using the application startup search as follows:
The Application Launcher can be launched through the Super/Windows key on your keyboard.
How to use the ip command to view network routes
Last but not least, here is the most recommended way of printing routing table information in Linux. Hets is how to use this command:
Though this information is not much reader-friendly as that of the previously mentioned commands, it is still enough for you to configure the route.
These were a few commands to view the routing table information on Debian. Though the ip route command in not neat looking, it is still the most recommended way of looking up for relevant routing table information. The other commands are considered obsolete but they may still be helpful in deriving what you need to extract.
View routing table using the route command
The route command also falls under the category of once widely used but now obsolete command to view routing tables. The manual page of this command also mentions that the command is now replaced by the ip route command.
Through this command, you can view exactly the same information that you could, through the netstat command. Here is how you can use it:
-n This flag is used to display the numerical addresses only
The output format is somewhat similar to that of the netstat command.
Use netstat command to view the routing table
The netstat command has always been a widely used method of printing routing table information in Linux. However, it is officially replaced by the ip route command. We are including it anyway as it is still an approach to retrieve the required information
Here is how you can use this command:
-r This flag is used to display the Kernel routing tables
-n This flag is used to display the numerical addresses
This is what the output indicates:
Destination | This column indicates the destination network |
Gateway | This column indicates the defined gateway for the network. If you see an * in this column, it means that no forwarding gateway is needed for the specified network. |
Genmask | This column indicates the netmask of the network. |
Flags | The U output in this columns means that the route is up. The G output indicates that specified gateway should be used for this route. D stands for dynamically installed, M stands for modified, and R means reinstated. |
MSS | This column indicates the default Maximum Segment Size(MSS) for TCP connections for this route. |
Window | This column indicates the default window size for TCP connections over this route. |
irtt | This column indicates the Initial Round Trip Time for this route. |
Iface | The Iface column shows the network interface. If you had more than one interface, you would see lo (for loopback), eth0 (first Ethernet device), and eth1 (for the second Ethernet device), and so on for the number of interfaces you have installed. |
How to View the Network Routing Table in Ubuntu Linux
Routing is the transfer of an IP packet from one point to another across the network. When you send someone an email, you’re actually transmitting a series of IP packets or datagrams from your system to the other person’s computer. The packets sent from your computer pass through several gateways or routers to get to the destination computer system. The same is true for all Internet protocols such as HTTP, IRC, FTP, etc.
In all Linux and UNIX systems, the information about how the IP packets should be routed is stored in a kernel structure. These structures are called routing tables. If you want your system to communicate with other computers, you may want to configure these routing tables. First, it is important to know how to view these routing tables on your Linux system.
In this article, we explain how to view the routing tables in Ubuntu using the following three common commands:
We have run the commands and procedures mentioned in this article on a Ubuntu 22.04 LTS system.
We are using the Ubuntu command line, the Terminal, in order to run the above-mentioned commands. You can open the Terminal either through the system Dash or the Ctrl+Alt+T shortcut.
How to View Routing Table?
Method 1: Through the netstat command
The netstat command has always been a widely used method of printing routing table information in Linux. However, it is officially replaced by the ip route command. We are including it anyway as it is still an approach to retrieve the required information.
Here is how you can use this command:
-r This flag is used to display the Kernel routing tables
-n This flag is used to display the numerical addresses
This is what the output indicates:
Destination | This column indicates the destination network. |
Gateway | This column indicates the defined gateway for the network. If you see an * in this column, it means that no forwarding gateway is needed for the specified network. |
Genmask | This column indicates the netmask of the network. |
Flags | The U output in this columns means that the route is up. The G output indicates that specified gateway should be used for this route. D stands for dynamically installed, M stands for modified, and R means reinstated. |
MSS | This column indicates the default Maximum Segment Size(MSS) for TCP connections for this route. |
Window | This column indicates the default window size for TCP connections over this route. |
Irtt | This column indicates the Initial Round Trip Time for this route. |
Iface | The Iface column shows the network interface. If you had more than one interface, you would see lo (for loopback), eth0 (first Ethernet device), and eth1 (for the second Ethernet device), and so on for the number of interfaces, you have installed. |
Method 2: Through the route command
The route command also falls under the category of once widely used but now obsolete command to view routing tables. The manual page of this command also mentions that the command is now replaced by the ip route command.
Through this command, you can view exactly the same information that you could, through the netstat command. Here is how you can use it:
-n This flag is used to display the numerical addresses only
Method 3: Through the ip route command
Last but not least, here is the most recommended way of printing routing table information in Linux. Here is how to use this command:
Though this information is not much reader-friendly as that of the previously mentioned commands, it is still enough for you to configure the router.
These were a few commands to view the routing table information in Ubuntu. Though the ip route command in not neat looking, it is still the most recommended way of looking up for relevant routing table information. Though the other commands are considered obsolete, they are sometimes really helpful in deriving what you need to extract.
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