在计算机网络中，网络地址转换（Network Address Translation，缩写为NAT），也叫做网络掩蔽或者IP掩蔽（IP masquerading），是一种在IP封包通过路由器或防火墙时重写来源IP地址或目的IP地址的技术。这种技术被普遍使用在有多台主机但只通过一个公有IP地址访问因特网的私有网络中。根据规范，路由器是不能这样工作的，但它的确是一个方便并得到了广泛应用的技术。当然，NAT也让主机之间的通信变得复杂，导致通信效率的降低。

Network address translation (NAT) is a methodology of remapping one IP address space into another by modifying network address information in Internet Protocol (IP) datagram packet headers while they are in transit across a traffic routing device. The technique was originally used for ease of rerouting traffic in IP networks without renumbering every host. It has become a popular and essential tool in conserving global address space allocations in face of IPv4 address exhaustion by sharing one Internet-routable IP address of a NAT gateway for an entire private network.