Localhost is the default name of the computer you are working on. The term is a pseudo name for 127.0.0.1, the IP address of the local computer. This IP address allows the machine to connect to and communicate with itself. Therefore, localhost (127.0.0.1) is used to establish an IP connection to the same device used by the end-user.

A good way to think of localhost, in computer networking, is to look at it as “this computer”. It is the default name used to establish a connection with your computer using the loopback address network. The loopback address has a default IP (127.0.0.1) useful to test programs on your computer, without sending information over the internet.

Localhost is a hostname that refers to the local machine currently making the request. On many computers, localhost is an alias for the IP address 127.0.0.1. When a computer pings this IP address, it is communicating with itself.

The IP address for localhost is 127.0.0.1 On almost all networking systems, localhost uses the IP address 127.0.0.1. That is the most commonly used IPv4 “loopback address” and it is reserved for that purpose.