COMPTIA A+ Practice Exam 2026 – 400 Free Practice Questions to Pass the Exam

A slash designation, also known as CIDR notation, specifies the number of bits used to represent the network address in an IP address. In Class B networks, the first two octets represent the network address, while the last two octets represent the host address. This means that Class B networks use a /16 slash designation, which indicates that the first 16 bits are used to represent the network address, while the remaining 16 bits represent the host address. Options A, C, and D are incorrect because they represent the slash designations for Class A, Class C, and host addresses, respectively. In Class A networks, the first octet represents the network address, requiring a /8 slash designation. In Class C networks, the first three octets represent the network address, requiring a /24 slash designation. And for host addresses, all 32 bits are used, so the /32 slash designation is not allocated to any type of network.