NetBox

NetBox is a free, open-source IP address management (IPAM) and data center infrastructure management (DCIM) application for network and infrastructure teams. A NetBox download gives you a web application that records what your network is supposed to look like: sites, racks, devices, interfaces, cables, prefixes, IP addresses, VLANs, circuits and power feeds, all tied together and exposed through a REST and GraphQL API. Admins use it as the “source of truth” that spreadsheets, Visio diagrams and tribal knowledge never quite managed to be.

NetBox began in 2016 inside DigitalOcean’s network engineering group and is now maintained by NetBox Labs together with a large community. It is written in Python on the Django framework and licensed under Apache-2.0. NetBox Labs sells a hosted NetBox Cloud and a supported NetBox Enterprise, but the Community edition on GitHub is the full product, not a cut-down version.

NetBox at a glance

What it does

• IPAM: aggregates, prefixes, IP ranges, individual addresses, VRFs and route targets, with automatic detection of available addresses inside a prefix.
• DCIM: regions, sites, locations, racks, device types, devices, modules, interfaces, console and power ports, and front/rear ports for patch panels.
• Cables and cable paths between interfaces, so you can trace a port end to end through patch panels and circuits.
• Circuits and providers for WAN links, plus VLANs, VLAN groups, wireless LANs and links.
• Power panels and feeds, with rack power utilisation calculated from device power ports.
• Virtual machines and clusters, so hypervisor guests and their interfaces live next to the physical gear.
• REST API, GraphQL API, webhooks and event rules that fire when objects change, which is what makes NetBox useful to Ansible, Nornir and similar tools.
• Change logging with user attribution, custom fields, custom validation rules, Jinja2 configuration templates and custom scripts and reports.

How sysadmins use it

Model a site and its racks

1. Go to Organization > Sites and add the site with its address and time zone. Add a Location for each room or cage if the site is large.
2. Under Racks, create each rack with its height in rack units and its role (for example “Server” or “Network”).
3. Import device types from the community Device Type Library (a separate GitHub repository with YAML definitions for thousands of hardware models). Each type carries its interfaces and ports, so you do not type them by hand.
4. Add devices to racks, set the rack position and face, and NetBox draws the rack elevation for you.

Allocate an IP address through the API

1. Create an API token for your user from the profile menu.
2. Ask NetBox for the next free address in a prefix instead of hunting through a spreadsheet:

   curl -s -X POST https://netbox.example.com/api/ipam/prefixes/12/available-ips/ 
     -H "Authorization: Token <token>" -H "Content-Type: application/json" 
     -d '{"description": "web03 management"}'

3. The response contains the newly created IP object. Assign it to a device interface from the GUI or with a second API call.

Use NetBox as the Ansible inventory

1. Install the netbox.netbox collection from Ansible Galaxy.
2. Create an inventory file netbox_inv.yml:

   plugin: netbox.netbox.nb_inventory
   api_endpoint: https://netbox.example.com
   token: "{{ lookup('env', 'NETBOX_TOKEN') }}"
   group_by:
     - device_roles
     - sites

3. Run ansible-inventory -i netbox_inv.yml --graph to confirm that hosts are grouped by role and site. From then on, a device added to NetBox is automatically in scope for playbooks.

Install and first run

Native install on Linux. NetBox 4.7 needs Python 3.12, 3.13 or 3.14, PostgreSQL 15 or later and Redis 6.0 or later. The official guide walks through six steps: PostgreSQL, Redis, the NetBox application, Gunicorn or uWSGI, nginx or Apache as the HTTPS reverse proxy, and optional LDAP. In short:

$ sudo mkdir -p /opt/netbox/ && cd /opt/netbox/
$ sudo git clone -b master https://github.com/netbox-community/netbox.git .
$ sudo cp netbox/netbox/configuration_example.py netbox/netbox/configuration.py
# set ALLOWED_HOSTS, DATABASES, REDIS, SECRET_KEY and API_TOKEN_PEPPERS
$ sudo /opt/netbox/upgrade.sh
$ source /opt/netbox/venv/bin/activate && cd /opt/netbox/netbox
$ python3 manage.py createsuperuser

Test with python3 manage.py runserver 0.0.0.0:8000 --insecure, then set up Gunicorn as a systemd service and put nginx in front with a real certificate. The development server is not for production.

Docker. The community netbox-docker project bundles PostgreSQL, Redis and NetBox:

$ git clone -b release https://github.com/netbox-community/netbox-docker.git
$ cd netbox-docker
$ cp docker-compose.override.yml.example docker-compose.override.yml
$ docker compose pull && docker compose up -d
$ docker compose exec netbox /opt/netbox/netbox/manage.py createsuperuser

NetBox listens on port 8000 by default; put a reverse proxy in front for TLS.

• Gotchas: a wrong or missing ALLOWED_HOSTS entry produces a 400 error on every request. Redis must be reachable before the first upgrade.sh. Keep PostgreSQL backups: the database is the whole product.
• Upgrades: read the release notes, back up the database, check out the new tag and run upgrade.sh again. Plugins must match the NetBox major version.

Limitations

• NetBox records intended state. It does not scan the network, poll SNMP or discover devices on its own. Discovery comes from separate tools or scripts that write into NetBox.
• Setup is more involved than a single-binary tool: PostgreSQL, Redis, a WSGI server and a reverse proxy are all your responsibility.
• Data quality depends on discipline. If people keep editing the switch without updating NetBox, it drifts like any other documentation.
• Reporting and visualisation are basic out of the box; the topology and diagramming features come from plugins.
• Major-version upgrades can break third-party plugins until their maintainers catch up.

NetBox vs alternatives

phpIPAM is simpler and focuses on IP addresses and subnets; it is a good fit when you do not need rack and cable modelling. Nautobot is a fork of NetBox with its own plugin ecosystem and a stronger automation focus. For the discovery side, Open-AudIT finds what is actually on the network and can feed its inventory into a system of record like NetBox, while Angry IP Scanner is the quick way to see which addresses in a NetBox prefix really answer. LanTopoLog covers switch-port maps on small Windows networks without a database behind it.

FAQ

Is NetBox free?

Yes. NetBox Community is free and open source under the Apache-2.0 licence, with no device or user limits. NetBox Cloud and NetBox Enterprise are the commercial editions from NetBox Labs.

What is NetBox IPAM?

IPAM is the part of NetBox that manages prefixes, IP ranges, addresses, VRFs and VLANs. It shows utilisation per prefix and hands out the next free address through the GUI or the API.

How do I run NetBox in Docker?

Use the official community project netbox-docker: clone the release branch, copy the override example, run docker compose up -d and create a superuser with manage.py createsuperuser. It brings its own PostgreSQL and Redis containers.

Is there a NetBox demo?

Yes. NetBox Labs hosts a public demo at demo.netbox.dev with sample sites, racks and prefixes, so you can evaluate the data model before installing anything.

What is the NetBox device type library?

A community GitHub repository of YAML definitions for hardware models from Cisco, Juniper, Dell, HPE and many others. Importing a definition creates the device type with all its interfaces and ports.

Does NetBox run on Windows?

Not natively. Run it on a Linux VM, in WSL for testing, or in Docker Desktop. The web interface works from any browser on any platform.

NetBox vs phpIPAM: which should I choose?

Pick phpIPAM for pure IP address management with a lighter stack. Pick NetBox when you also need racks, devices, cables, circuits and an API that automation can depend on.

Last checked against official sources: 6 October 2026 (developer website: netboxlabs.com). Versions and licence terms change — confirm on the developer's site before deploying in production.