Determine the network address of a subnet from an IP address and mask or prefix length.
The network address is found by performing a bitwise AND between the IP address and its subnet mask. This zeroes out the host bits, leaving only the network portion — the identifier for the subnet itself.
Network address
network = IP AND subnet_mask
No — the network address (all host bits zero) identifies the subnet itself and cannot be assigned to a host in standard subnetting. The exception is /31 point-to-point links per RFC 3021.
Routers store network addresses (with their prefix lengths) in routing tables to determine which interface or next-hop to forward packets toward for any destination within that network.