One Year after World IPv6 Launch, Number of IPv6-Connected Internet Users Doubles

Major network providers and web companies increasingly offer IPv6 as a standard service

WASHINGTON, D.C., USA and GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – 3 June 2013 – The number of IPv6-connected users has doubled since World IPv6 Launch began on June 6, 2012, when thousands of Internet service providers (ISPs), home networking equipment manufacturers, and Web companies around the world came together to permanently enable the next generation of Internet Protocol (IPv6) for their products and services. This marks the third straight year IPv6 use on the global Internet has doubled. If current trends continue, more than half of Internet users around the world will be IPv6-connected in less than 6 years.

“The year since World IPv6 Launch began has cemented what we know will be an increasing reality on the Internet: IPv6 is ready for business,” said Leslie Daigle, the Internet Society’s Chief Internet Technology Officer. “Forward-looking network operators are successfully using IPv6 to reduce their dependency on expensive, complex network address translation systems (CGNs) to deal with a shortage of IPv4 addresses. Leaders of organizations that aspire to reach all Internet users must accelerate their IPv6 deployment plans now, or lose an important competitive edge.”

As IPv6 adoption continues to grow, members of the worldwide Internet community are contributing to its deployment. Statistics reported by World IPv6 Launch participants underscore the increasing deployment of IPv6 worldwide:

Google reports the number of visitors to its sites using IPv6 has more than doubled in the past year.

The number of networks that have deployed IPv6 continues to grow, with more than 100 worldwide reporting significant IPv6 traffic.

Australian ISP Internode reports that 10 percent of its customers now use IPv6 to access the Internet.

Akamai reports that it is currently delivering approximately 10 billion requests per day over IPv6, which represents a 250 percent growth rate since June of last year.

KDDI measurement shows that the number of IPv6 users of KDDI has doubled and that IPv6 traffic has increased approximately three times from last year.

World IPv6 Launch participants have worked together to help drive adoption, leading to the creation of World IPv6 Day in 2011, in which hundreds of websites joined together for a successful global 24-hour test flight of IPv6. This was followed by World IPv6 Launch in 2012, in which more than a thousand participants permanently enabled IPv6 for their products and services, including four of the most visited websites: Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Yahoo!.

As a platform for innovation and economic development, the Internet plays a critical role in the daily lives of billions. This momentum has not slowed — IPv6 adoption continues to skyrocket, fast establishing itself as the “new normal” and a must-have for any business with an eye towards the future.

For more information about companies that have deployed IPv6, as well as links to useful information for users and how other companies can participate in the continued deployment of IPv6, please visit: http://www.worldipv6launch.org

About the need for IPv6

IPv4 has approximately four billion IP addresses (the sequence of numbers assigned to each Internet-connected device). The explosion in the number of people, devices, and web services on the Internet means that IPv4 is running out of space. IPv6, the next-generation Internet protocol which provides more than 340 trillion, trillion, trillion addresses, will connect the billions of people not connected today and will help ensure the Internet can continue its current growth rate indefinitely.