The Hosts file contains lines of text consisting of an IP address in the first text field followed by one or more host names. Each field is separated by white space Tabs are often preferred for historical reasons, but spaces are also used. Comment lines may be included, and they are indicated by a hash character in the first position of such lines. Entirely blank lines in the file are ignored. If the Hosts file is changed from default, resetting it can help resolve some connectivity issues.
To reset the Hosts file back to the default, follow these steps according to your operating system:. Open Notepad.
Copy the following text, and then paste the text into the file: Copyright c Microsoft Corp. This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name. The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one space.
Additionally, comments such as these may be inserted on individual lines or following the machine name denoted by a ' ' symbol. For example: On the File menu, select Save as , type "hosts" in the File name box as displayed in the following image , and then save the file to the desktop.
Tap and hold or right-click the Hosts file, select Rename , and then rename the file as "Hosts. If you are prompted to enter an administrator password, select Continue. To do this, swipe in from the right edge of the screen, tap Search , type Notepad, and then tap the Notepad icon. Or, if you are using a mouse, point to the upper-right corner of the screen, move the mouse pointer down, click Search , type Notepad, and then click Notepad.
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Forum only search News:. Home Help Login Register. Pages: [ 1 ] Go Down. I have recently purchased a new laptop with Windows XP 64 bit installed. I have installed a software application and would like to update the hosts file. However I can't change its permissions to allow me to do so. My user id is a member of the admin. So everyone on computer B is stuck without Google until someone updates the hosts file.
When that person does update the hosts file, they add another entry to handle Google with the www subdomain. Now everyone on computer B is taken to the correct website whether they visit google. And everyone on computer A can only visit google.
If you're thinking that someone should have just made a central repository to map all IP addresses with all hostnames, that's exactly what happened. Early on, a central hosts file was manually maintained and shared by the Stanford Research Institute. This system lead to the invention of domains and top level domains like. In the end, the humble hosts file and innovators like Elizabeth J. Feinler lead to the invention of the Domain Name System still in use today.
First, open Notepad as an administrator by pressing the Windows key, typing in "notepad", and clicking "Run as administrator":. You won't be able to see any files in this directory because they aren't text documents. To change the file type, click on the dropdown in the bottom right of the Open menu and click on "All Files":.
Note that everything is commented out with characters, meaning that nothing is actually being read from the hosts file. Modern versions of Windows include a sort of DNS system already, so if you visit localhost it'll automatically redirect you to If you're doing some local development and are having problems with localhost, you can just remove the comments from your hosts file:.
Then, open PowerShell by pressing the Windows key, searching for "powershell", and clicking "Run as Administrator":. After that, you should be able to visit localhost in your browser and see whatever you're hacking on. If you're still having issues, try closing your browser completely, then open a new browser window and try again.
Even though hosts files have fallen out of favor with newer systems like DNS, they still work for legacy reasons. And hackers have definitely taken advantage of this in the past. What they would do is point a common website like google. This IP address could serve a site that looks just like Google's, but is actually trying to steal your sensitive information.
While this was a problem in the past, most security software like the Windows Security Suite can recognize and fix problems with the hosts file automatically. That said, if you open up your hosts file and see a lot of strange entries, then you may want to revert to the default Windows hosts file. Just copy and paste the default hosts file from earlier in the article into your hosts file and save. Note that some third-party security software uses the hosts file to block dangerous websites.
If that's the case, no worries — your security software should add all those entries back to your hosts file. We'll go over how this works in the next section. Don't want friends or family to visit certain websites on your computer? Or are you like me and get distracted by all the cat photos on the internet?
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