It would be a blessing in disguise: India and China have become leaders in IPv6 adoption because they once had very few IPv4 addresses

Asia has become the second region in the world to achieve 50% IPv6 compatibility, according to data from the laboratories of the Asia-Pacific Network Information Center (APNIC), a network registrar that oversees Internet resources in the Asia-Pacific region, The Register reports. According to the organization’s management, this result was achieved “25 years after the start of regional IPv6 implementation.”

Of course, this does not mean that in the 56 countries from Afghanistan to Oceania, which are part of the APNIC area of ​​responsibility, devices work only on IPv6. In this case, we are talking only about the readiness of hosts in the region to support IPv6, and this is average data for 30 days based on tests and analysis by APNIC Labs. A host is considered IPv6-compatible if APNIC Labs can load a URL via IPv6. In this case, the host can be dual-stack and support IPv4.

Image source: Haberdoedas / Unsplash

In Asia, China and India lead in IPv6 adoption, and there is a certain irony to that. While APNIC attributes this to the huge number of active users, government support for the transition to IPV6, and massive investments in such networks, there is another dimension to the issue. According to experts, China and India received very few IPv4 addresses in the early days of the Internet, so these countries with gigantic human resources had to focus on IPv6 almost from the very beginning.

Source here and below: APNIC

Formally, the world leader in IPv6 compatibility is the United States and Canada (ARIN) with an average monthly rate of 52%, but this region accounts for only 9.6% of the world’s IPv6 users, while APNIC countries have 64%. Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia (RIPE NCC) account for 16% of IPv6 users, and the level of IPv6 support is 28%. As for South America and the Caribbean (LACNIC), we are talking about 10.7% and 39%, respectively. Finally, in the case of Africa (AFRINIC), the share of IPv6 users is only 0.9%, and the overall level of IPv6 support is 4%. (APNIC apparently has a typo in one of the values, since the sum of the shares of IPv6 users is 101% – Ed.)

APAC Leaders in IPv6 Adoption

According to some APNIC experts, in the context of the Internet evolution, the transition to IPv6 is generally not necessary and mandatory, since the widespread use of NAT will allow IPv4 to continue to meet demand. In addition, the use of content delivery networks (CDN), as well as TLS and DNS for servicing users, reduces the importance of specific IP addresses. In general, APNIC believes that the global Internet will most likely remain dual-stack for a long time.

The organization assumes that IPv6 penetration is linear and is currently at 34%. The introduction of 5G (and 6G in the future) in many countries will lead to the growth of IPv6 in the mobile segment, which will maintain a stable dynamic of expanding compatibility with the new protocol around the world. Not long ago, information appeared on Vietnam’s strategy, which provides for a total transition to IPv6 in the coming years, and China decided at the end of 2023 to provide all new SOHO equipment with IPv6 support.