Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Change MAC Address VS Wireshark

Compare Change MAC Address VS Wireshark and see what are their differences

Change MAC Address logo Change MAC Address

A powerful and simple tool for changing the MAC address of a network adapter.

Wireshark logo Wireshark

Wireshark is a network protocol analyzer for Unix and Windows. It lets you capture and interactively browse the traffic running on a computer network.
  • Change MAC Address Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-16
  • Wireshark Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-10-11

Change MAC Address features and specs

  • Privacy Enhancement
    Changing your MAC address can help improve privacy by making it harder for networks to track your device based on its hardware address.
  • Bypass Network Restrictions
    Some networks use MAC filtering to restrict access. Changing your MAC address may allow you to bypass these restrictions.
  • Testing and Development
    For developers and testers, being able to change the MAC address can help in testing network configurations and applications under different hardware identities.
  • Multiple Device Simulation
    By changing a MAC address, users can simulate multiple devices for software testing or network management purposes.

Possible disadvantages of Change MAC Address

  • Potential Network Conflicts
    Changing a MAC address might cause conflicts if another device on the same network has the same address, resulting in connectivity issues.
  • May Violate Terms of Service
    Altering your MAC address could violate the terms of service of some networks or service providers.
  • Limited Effectiveness
    Changing the MAC address won't bypass more sophisticated network tracking systems that use other identifiers, like IP addresses.
  • Technical Complexity
    For non-technical users, changing a MAC address might be complex and could lead to network misconfigurations or connectivity issues.

Wireshark features and specs

  • Comprehensive Protocol Support
    Wireshark supports a vast number of protocols out of the box, allowing for detailed inspection and analysis of network traffic.
  • Free and Open-Source
    Wireshark is free to use and its source code is openly available, enabling customization and community-driven improvements.
  • Cross-Platform Compatibility
    Wireshark runs on various operating systems including Windows, macOS, and Linux, making it accessible to a wide audience.
  • Rich Feature Set
    It offers features like live capture, offline analysis, deep inspection of hundreds of protocols, and powerful display filters for granular traffic analysis.
  • Strong Community Support
    A large and active community provides extensive documentation, tutorials, and support forums, making it easier for users to troubleshoot and learn.

Possible disadvantages of Wireshark

  • Steep Learning Curve
    Due to its extensive feature set and technical nature, Wireshark can be challenging for beginners to master.
  • Resource Intensive
    Live traffic capture and analysis can consume considerable system resources, which may affect performance, especially on less powerful machines.
  • Security Risks
    Running packet capture tools like Wireshark on production systems carries inherent security risks, as it could potentially expose sensitive data.
  • Interface Complexity
    The user interface, while powerful, can be overwhelming and non-intuitive for new users, making navigation and finding specific features difficult.
  • Limited Support for Encrypted Traffic
    Wireshark has limited capabilities when it comes to analyzing encrypted traffic, as decryption support requires additional setup and access to encryption keys.

Analysis of Wireshark

Overall verdict

  • Yes, Wireshark is considered an excellent tool for network analysis. Its open-source nature, regular updates, and strong community support further enhance its reputation as a reliable and robust tool.

Why this product is good

  • Wireshark is widely regarded as a leading network protocol analyzer due to its comprehensive features, user-friendly interface, and extensive protocol support. It allows users to capture and examine data packets in real-time, making it invaluable for diagnosing network issues, performing security audits, and educational purposes.

Recommended for

  • Network administrators looking to troubleshoot connectivity issues.
  • Security professionals conducting penetration tests and analyzing network traffic for vulnerabilities.
  • Students and educators who need a practical tool to learn about network protocols and behaviors.
  • IT professionals managing complex networks who require detailed traffic analysis.

Change MAC Address videos

How to Change MAC Address Windows 10

More videos:

  • Tutorial - How to change my Computer PC MAC Address - Change mac address

Wireshark videos

Wireshark Tutorial for Beginners

More videos:

  • Review - Monitor Network Traffic with Wireshark - Review
  • Review - Wireshark 101: CloudShark Review - HakTip 144

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Change MAC Address and Wireshark)
Monitoring Tools
5 5%
95% 95
Security & Privacy
100 100%
0% 0
Log Management
0 0%
100% 100
Web Scraping
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Change MAC Address and Wireshark

Change MAC Address Reviews

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Wireshark Reviews

9 Best Angry IP Scanner Alternatives Reviewed 2021 (Free & Paid)
The beauty in Wireshark is that your network scans can be as broad or as granular as you make them. With a few clicks, you can begin capturing a snapshot of all packet traffic across your local area network. It can be overwhelming at first to see every single packet across a network, but Wireshark makes isolating specific events simple with its color coding and filtering...
10 Best WireShark Alternatives for Android Devices in 2021
If you are well enough into network communication, you must know about WireShark. WireShark is the most popular network analyzer for PC. You can use WireShark to see anything on your network that’s not encrypted. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have an Android app, however, you can still track, monitor, or capture network packets on your Android devices using our best list of...
Source: techreen.com
11 Best Wireshark Alternatives in 2020
Wireshark is a widely used network monitoring and WiFi troubleshooting tool. However, with Wireshark tool is that you can only gather information from the network but cannot send this information.
Source: www.guru99.com
5 Best Wireshark alternative packet sniffers
Wireshark & Alternative tools FAQs ⭐Can Wireshark do deep packet inspection or do I need something else?⭐Is Wireshark a vulnerability scanner?⭐Is Wireshark good at port scanning?⭐Which tool is a command line alternative to Wireshark?
Comparing Charles Proxy, Fiddler, Wireshark, and Requestly
Although thousands of developers around the globe use Wireshark and Charles Proxy, they fail to occupy the top side in the design aspect. Wireshark’s interface is robust and detailed but can be intimidating for beginners. While Charles Proxy has a more approachable interface compared to Wireshark, it might seem cluttered to some users. Fiddler’s UI is information-rich and...
Source: dev.to

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Wireshark seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 11 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Change MAC Address mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of Change MAC Address yet. Tracking of Change MAC Address recommendations started around Mar 2021.

Wireshark mentions (11)

  • Wifi problematic, wired connections seem okay. Help?
    Https://wireshark.org, opening that, go to edit preferences and enable "IP network" in the name resolution area, to show website names instead of only IP addresses. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Eeros in bridge mode with wired home
    To prove this, download wireshark Https://wireshark.org/. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Lose internet when downloading large files
    Give that a try and I'll re-recommend for a second time, to run and watch Wireshark: Https://wireshark.org. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Performance scores for Google Lighthouse/Insights seem to be very inaccurate
    Https://www.gap.com/ returned a performance score of 10/100, with a time to interactive score of 36.1 seconds! Https://www.patreon.com/ returned a score of 18 Https://wireshark.org/ returned a score of 28, with "unused javascript" taking 14.9 seconds to load. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Is there a way to programatically turn off Downtime on a child device?
    I tried using Wireshark to figure out which URL is being called but my knowledge here is VERY limited and I couldn’t figure it out. Source: about 3 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Change MAC Address and Wireshark, you can also consider the following products

Technitium MAC Address Changer - Technitium MAC Address Changer (TMAC) is a freeware utility to instantly change or spoof MAC Address of any network card (NIC).

Zabbix - Track, record, alert and visualize performance and availability of IT resources

TCPView - TCPView is a Windows program that will show you detailed listings of all TCP and UDP endpoints on...

Datadog - See metrics from all of your apps, tools & services in one place with Datadog's cloud monitoring as a service solution. Try it for free.

Win10Pcap - Win10Pcap is a WinPcap-based Ethernet packet capture library.

SolarWinds NPM - Advanced network monitoring for on-premises, hybrid, and cloud. Download a FREE 30-day trial of SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) today!