Is IPv6 Faster Or Slower Than IPv4?

What is IPv4?

IP stands for Internet Protocol. It is a numerical label assigned to each device in the given network. Almost 94% of the network today use IPv4. Developed during the times of ARPANET, IPv4 has gained massive popularity since.

IPv4 uses 32-bit scheme for web addresses, so it allows storing a whopping 2^32 web address.

What is IPv6?

The rate at which devices burgeoned since ARPANET made network engineers realize the need for more IP addresses. Furthermore, there were issues with IPv4 that had to be resolved but the existing IPs could not have changed.

Difference Between IPv6 and IPv4

The latter, IPv4, is 32-Bit whereas IPv6 is a 128-bit web address. periods separate IPv4 address, while a colon is used in case of IPv6.

IPv4 is the first and the oldest IP in use today and has undergone little changes since its use in ARPANET. It is a complete numeric address and the bits are separated by dots (.)

IPv6 is the most recent version of IP. The address is a combination of alphabets and numerals, called Alphanumeric, and the bits are separated by colons (:).

IPv4 allows a definite number of IP addresses classes, which has been a persistent issue. The classes are numbered from A to E. IPv6 can have an unlimited number of addresses.

One of the greatest downsides considered with the use of IPv4 is that the network needs to be configured manually or with DCHP. This really limits the level of automation that can be achieved while using IPv4.

IPv6 has provisions for supporting auto configuration, which is considered one of the major improvements over the IPv4.

Compatibility with Mobile Devices

Because IPv4 uses the dot network it is not suitable for mobile network and thus IPv6 is the only choice when rendering IP to mobile devices is the essence.

Despite having an upper hand over its IPv4 counterpart, IPv6 is still not widely used because of NAT (network address translation). NAT takes private addresses and then turns them into public addresses. NAT is what enables a corporate device having a private IP to communicate with public devices. Private IPs are confined to a private network and enables one device to identify the other within the network. When one these devices need to communicate with an external network or another device outside the network, it does so using NAT, which assigns it a public address.

Is IPv6 Faster or Slower Than IPv4?

Which is faster IPv4 or IPv6?

IPv4 vs IPv6 stack almost equally against each other when it comes to speed.

There is a mixed opinion among people if it is IPv6 slower than IPv4. However, IPv4 vs IPv6 speed comparison show the two perform similarly and the result cannot be compared until test conditions are standardized.

Is IPv6 faster than IPv4? While there are indicators that point positively to this statement, it cannot be definitely asserted that IPv6 provides better performance than IPv4. IPv6 is still building momentum and the race is still on. Today, the network traffic volume running on IPv6 could be around 20 per cent of the total volume. This is bound to rise to around 50 per cent of the internet's total traffic in a few years. That's when the speed comparison of IPv4 and IPv6 can be really compared.

The comparison issue can probably never be settled because just as IPv4 continues to be a work-in-progress IPv6 is never going to be settled. There is still work to be done on IPv6 and that's why right now the comparison could be like the apples and oranges story.

Speed of IPv4 is affected because it uses NAT for translating a public IP address to a private one. This process will take up a key sum of the available bandwidth and affect the rate of data transfer through the NAT firewall. IPv6 does not use up excess bandwidth as it does not require NAT. This could be one of the reasons why IPv6 appears to have a greater speed than IPv4.

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