Nmap Cheat Sheet

Target Specification

Switch	Example	Description
	nmap 192.168.1.1	Scan a single IP
	nmap 192.168.1.1 192.168.2.1	Scan specific IPs
	nmap 192.168.1.1-254	Scan a range
	nmap scanme.nmap.org	Scan a domain
	nmap 192.168.1.0/24	Scan using CIDR notation
-iL	nmap -iL targets.txt	Scan targets from a file
-iR	nmap -iR 100	Scan 100 random hosts
--exclude	nmap --exclude 192.168.1.1	Exclude listed hosts

Scan Techniques

Switch	Example	Description
-sS	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sS	TCP SYN port scan (Default)
-sT	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sT	TCP connect port scan (Default without root privilege)
-sU	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sU	UDP port scan
-sA	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sA	TCP ACK port scan
-sW	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sW	TCP Window port scan
-sM	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sM	TCP Maimon port scan

Host Discovery

Switch	Example	Description
-sL	nmap 192.168.1.1-3 -sL	No Scan. List targets only
-sn	nmap 192.168.1.1/24 -sn	Disable port scanning. Host discovery only.
-Pn	nmap 192.168.1.1-5 -Pn	Disable host discovery. Port scan only.
-PS	nmap 192.168.1.1-5 -PS22-25,80	TCP SYN discovery on port x. Port 80 by default
-PA	nmap 192.168.1.1-5 -PA22-25,80	TCP ACK discovery on port x. Port 80 by default
-PU	nmap 192.168.1.1-5 -PU53	UDP discovery on port x. Port 40125 by default
-PR	nmap 192.168.1.1-1/24 -PR	ARP discovery on local network
-n	nmap 192.168.1.1 -n	Never do DNS resolution

Port Specification

Switch	Example	Description
-p	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p 21	Port scan for port x
-p	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p 21-100	Port range
-p	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p U:53,T:21-25,80	Port scan multiple TCP and UDP ports
-p-	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p-	Port scan all ports
-p	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p http,https	Port scan from service name
-F	nmap 192.168.1.1 -F	Fast port scan (100 ports)
--top-ports	nmap 192.168.1.1 --top-ports 2000	Port scan the top x ports
-p-65535	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p-65535	Leaving off initial port in range makes the scan start at port 1
-p0-	nmap 192.168.1.1 -p0-	Leaving off end port in range makes the scan go through to port 65535

Service and Version Detection

Switch	Example	Description
-sV	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sV	Attempts to determine the version of the service running on port
-sV --version-intensity	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sV --version-intensity 8	Intensity level 0 to 9. Higher number increases possibility of correctness
-sV --version-light	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sV --version-light	Enable light mode. Lower possibility of correctness. Faster
-sV --version-all	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sV --version-all	Enable intensity level 9. Higher possibility of correctness. Slower
-A	nmap 192.168.1.1 -A	Enables OS detection, version detection, script scanning, and traceroute

OS Detection

Switch	Example	Description
-O	nmap 192.168.1.1 -O	Remote OS detection using TCP/IP stack fingerprinting
-O --osscan-limit	nmap 192.168.1.1 -O --osscan-limit	If at least one open and one closed TCP port are not found it will not try OS detection against host
-O --osscan-guess	nmap 192.168.1.1 -O --osscan-guess	Makes Nmap guess more aggressively
-O --max-os-tries	nmap 192.168.1.1 -O --max-os-tries 1	Set the maximum number x of OS detection tries against a target
-A	nmap 192.168.1.1 -A	Enables OS detection, version detection, script scanning, and traceroute

Timing and Performance

Switch	Example	Description
-T0	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T0	Paranoid (0) Intrusion Detection System evasion
-T1	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T1	Sneaky (1) Intrusion Detection System evasion
-T2	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T2	Polite (2) slows down the scan to use less bandwidth and use less target machine resources
-T3	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T3	Normal (3) which is default speed
-T4	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T4	Aggressive (4) speeds scans; assumes you are on a reasonably fast and reliable network
-T5	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T5	Insane (5) speeds scan; assumes you are on an extraordinarily fast network

Switch	Example input	Description
--host-timeout <time>	1s; 4m; 2h	Give up on target after this long
--min-rtt-timeout/max-rtt-timeout/initial-rtt-timeout <time>	1s; 4m; 2h	Specifies probe round trip time
--min-hostgroup/max-hostgroup <size<size>	50; 1024	Parallel host scan group sizes
--min-parallelism/max-parallelism <numprobes>	10; 1	Probe parallelization
--scan-delay/--max-scan-delay <time>	20ms; 2s; 4m; 5h	Adjust delay between probes
--max-retries <tries>	3	Specify the maximum number of port scan probe retransmissions
--min-rate <number>	100	Send packets no slower than <numberr> per second
--max-rate <number>	100	Send packets no faster than <number> per second

NSE Scripts

Switch	Example	Description
-sC	nmap 192.168.1.1 -sC	Scan with default NSE scripts. Considered useful for discovery and safe
--script default	nmap 192.168.1.1 --script default	Scan with default NSE scripts. Considered useful for discovery and safe
--script	nmap 192.168.1.1 --script=banner	Scan with a single script. Example banner
--script	nmap 192.168.1.1 --script=http*	Scan with a wildcard. Example http
--script	nmap 192.168.1.1 --script=http,banner	Scan with two scripts. Example http and banner
--script	nmap 192.168.1.1 --script "not intrusive"	Scan default, but remove intrusive scripts
--script-args	nmap --script snmp-sysdescr --script-args snmpcommunity=admin 192.168.1.1	NSE script with arguments

Useful NSE Script Examples

Command	Description
nmap -Pn --script=http-sitemap-generator scanme.nmap.org	http site map generator
nmap -n -Pn -p 80 --open -sV -vvv --script banner,http-title -iR 1000	Fast search for random web servers
nmap -Pn --script=dns-brute domain.com	Brute forces DNS hostnames guessing subdomains
nmap -n -Pn -vv -O -sV --script smb-enum,smb-ls,smb-mbenum,smb-os-discovery,smb-s,smb-vuln,smbv2 -vv 192.168.1.1	Safe SMB scripts to run
nmap --script whois* domain.com	Whois query
nmap -p80 --script http-unsafe-output-escaping scanme.nmap.org	Detect cross site scripting vulnerabilities
nmap -p80 --script http-sql-injection scanme.nmap.org	Check for SQL injections

Firewall / IDS Evasion and Spoofing

Switch	Example	Description
-f	nmap 192.168.1.1 -f	Requested scan (including ping scans) use tiny fragmented IP packets. Harder for packet filters
--mtu	nmap 192.168.1.1 --mtu 32	Set your own offset size
-D	nmap -D 192.168.1.101,192.168.1.102, 192.168.1.103,192.168.1.23 192.168.1.1	Send scans from spoofed IPs
-D	nmap -D decoy-ip1,decoy-ip2,your-own-ip,decoy-ip3,decoy-ip4 remote-host-ip	Above example explained
-S	nmap -S www.microsoft.com www.facebook.com	Scan Facebook from Microsoft (-e eth0 -Pn may be required)
-g	nmap -g 53 192.168.1.1	Use given source port number
--proxies	nmap --proxies http://192.168.1.1:8080, http://192.168.1.2:8080 192.168.1.1	Relay connections through HTTP/SOCKS4 proxies
--data-length	nmap --data-length 200 192.168.1.1	Appends random data to sent packets

Example IDS Evasion command

nmap -f -t 0 -n -Pn –data-length 200 -D 192.168.1.101,192.168.1.102,192.168.1.103,192.168.1.23 192.168.1.1

Output

Switch	Example	Description
-oN	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oN normal.file	Normal output to the file normal.file
-oX	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oX xml.file	XML output to the file xml.file
-oG	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oG grep.file	Grepable output to the file grep.file
-oA	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oA results	Output in the three major formats at once
-oG -	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oG -	Grepable output to screen. -oN -, -oX - also usable
--append-output	nmap 192.168.1.1 -oN file.file --append-output	Append a scan to a previous scan file
-v	nmap 192.168.1.1 -v	Increase the verbosity level (use -vv or more for greater effect)
-d	nmap 192.168.1.1 -d	Increase debugging level (use -dd or more for greater effect)
--reason	nmap 192.168.1.1 --reason	Display the reason a port is in a particular state, same output as -vv
--open	nmap 192.168.1.1 --open	Only show open (or possibly open) ports
--packet-trace	nmap 192.168.1.1 -T4 --packet-trace	Show all packets sent and received
--iflist	nmap --iflist	Shows the host interfaces and routes
--resume	nmap --resume results.file	Resume a scan

Helpful Nmap Output examples

Command	Description
nmap -p80 -sV -oG - --open 192.168.1.1/24 \| grep open	Scan for web servers and grep to show which IPs are running web servers
nmap -iR 10 -n -oX out.xml \| grep "Nmap" \| cut -d " " -f5 > live-hosts.txt	Generate a list of the IPs of live hosts
nmap -iR 10 -n -oX out2.xml \| grep "Nmap" \| cut -d " " -f5 >> live-hosts.txt	Append IP to the list of live hosts
ndiff scanl.xml scan2.xml	Compare output from nmap using the ndif
xsltproc nmap.xml -o nmap.html	Convert nmap xml files to html files
grep " open " results.nmap \| sed -r 's/ +/ /g' \| sort \| uniq -c \| sort -rn \| less	Reverse sorted list of how often ports turn up

Miscellaneous Options

Switch	Example	Description
-6	nmap -6 2607:f0d0:1002:51::4	Enable IPv6 scanning
-h	nmap -h	nmap help screen

Other Useful Nmap Commands

Command	Description
nmap -iR 10 -PS22-25,80,113,1050,35000 -v -sn	Discovery only on ports x, no port scan
nmap 192.168.1.1-1/24 -PR -sn -vv	Arp discovery only on local network, no port scan
nmap -iR 10 -sn -traceroute	Traceroute to random targets, no port scan
nmap 192.168.1.1-50 -sL --dns-server 192.168.1.1	Query the Internal DNS for hosts, list targets only

Comments

Milton says

July 20, 2017 at 9:28 pm

Thanks a lot for the information. it is very useful.

Jimmy Toriola says

July 20, 2017 at 9:51 pm

That will be a helpful tipsheet. Thank you so much. I can learn more about it. looking forward to the hacking course from you.

Eddie says

July 21, 2017 at 12:43 am

Looking forward to it. I use nmap most days but only use a limited number of switches.

Oliver Suzuki says

July 21, 2017 at 2:41 pm

Keep the good hands-on stuff coming

Fran says

July 21, 2017 at 6:23 pm

Thank you very much in deed, very useful, I will buy your course on nmap, I want to insist about a Firewall course there aren’t around, I guess it is a good investment for you, I bought already all your courses and they are the best! Please keep going!

Celestino J says

July 24, 2017 at 5:52 pm

Great news.
In expectation of this course.
As usual ,
Thanks for what you doing.

Marious says

October 18, 2017 at 6:00 pm

I think this is very Useful,Thank you soo much.Am enjoying the training and practice.

Arthur says

November 2, 2017 at 5:28 pm

Love it. Thank you Nathan!

Horacio Castellini says

December 1, 2017 at 11:47 am

Muchas gracias ,,, me fue de utilidad,,,

krishna says

December 11, 2017 at 7:49 am

How to test .net Web services using ZenMap

- Nathan House says
  
  December 11, 2017 at 11:10 am
  
  You will need to expand on this question as I’m not clear what you are asking?
  
Abdulrahman Mogram says

December 31, 2017 at 10:05 am

Thank you for sharing this information!

reike says

January 10, 2018 at 2:58 pm

Thank you for this cheatsheet.
I think there is a mistake concerning the -sS switch. It is not the default one.
Normally, -sT is the default one and -sS needs root privileges.

- Nathan House says
  
  January 10, 2018 at 3:26 pm
  
  Default with root. I assume you are running as root!
  
sudo says

January 13, 2018 at 4:00 pm

Hi

This is very helpful. Thanks a lot!