IPv4 vs IPv6: Why IPv4 Still Matters in the IPv6 Era
IPv6 was supposed to end IPv4 scarcity. Twenty-five years later, IPv4 prices are at decade highs. Here is why the old protocol refuses to retire.
The promise of IPv6
IPv6 was designed in the 1990s to make address scarcity a memory: 340 undecillion addresses, more than the internet will ever need. Governments and operators spent decades pushing migration, and the protocol works well where it is deployed.
The reality: slow, dual, messy
Twenty-five years in, most of the internet still runs on IPv4, often behind CGNAT. Every network operator must serve both stacks for years to come, which means every new service still needs IPv4 addresses — and the pool of new ones has been empty since 2020.
Why prices keep rising
Scarcity meets demand: cloud providers charge $40+ per address per year, leasing desks rent blocks by the month, and the transfer market clears at tens of dollars per address. IPv6 adoption reduces the pressure only slowly, while every startup and every new network adds IPv4 demand.
What it means for you
If you hold dormant IPv4, you hold a scarce, liquid asset that has appreciated for a decade. If you need addresses, the smart play is to know the market — and to know which blocks are quietly waiting to be released. That is exactly the signal IPDORM maps.