IPv4 blocks

pavlosinterlir

pavlosinterlir

New member
Hi guys!

Although I am developing an IPv4 brokerage and rent software platform, it's not an advertising. I really want to discuss the current market situation and get the feedback from market professionals.

These days IPv4 blocks are very expensive, if you have not acquired some 3-5 years ago from RIR, it's rather expensive to buy IPs now. Even /24 will cost around 12k if you go to a broker. It will take more than 6 months (if not more) to get your network from RIPE NCC or other RIR.

My question is : Is it still required for a dedicated server to have IPv4 or you would prefer to use IPv6?

Where do you get new IPv4 blocks? Do you buy them or rent from brokers or platforms such Prefixx, IPXO or InterLIR?

Best regards,
Pavel
 
What an excellent subject for a discussion.

Some number of years ago I was offered to invest in IPv4, I was a little sceptical about it as I thought something else was going to come up. Would love to hear opinions on this and thoughts whether prices will continue to climb, remain the same or cool off.
 
Hi!

My team has made a research regarding current market state. Although, it's hard to predict a market price for such type of assets (or any, these turbulent times), you can expect, given market dynamics and usefulness of IPv4, that IPv4 prices will increase.

Our key findings are :
  • The main share in the total volume of world transfers of IP addresses is occupied by the RIPE region.
  • RIPE accounts for 63.81% of the total IP address market.
  • The share of RIPE in the total volume of the structure has grown by 22.75% since 2017 year.
  • The share of Lacnic in the overall structure also increased (+1.14% in 2022 compared to 2017).
  • APNIC and ARIN reduced by 9.8% and 12.9%, respectively, their share in the total IP address market compared to 2017.
  • The main share in the structure of IP allocated addresses RIPE falls on the /22 network.
  • In APNIC, the situation is similar to RIPE in terms of the allocated IP addresses market structure.
  • The bulk of allocated IP addresses falls on /22.
  • The situation in Afrinic is different in terms of market structure from RIPE and APNIC – this region is dominated by transfers of the cheapest networks - /24
  • In the /20, /21, /22 price segments, there is a downward trend in the average price for the sale of IP addresses.
  • In the RIPE region, the average price for /22 dropped from €48.60 to €48.19 per IP address. Also in this region, prices for /21 decreased from 48.58 euros to 47.30 euros, /20, in turn, fell in price from 44.59 euros in March to 42.96 euros in June.

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@Artashes If most open-source developers and projects release IPv6-supported versions of their software, then the prices of IPv4 addresses would go down. However, most open-source projects are underfunded and the corporations simply take advantage of the FOSS projects. So, it is not very likely for developers to put a significant effort in driving the software apps industry towards IPv6 since they did not get what they deserved with IPv4. At the same time, Big Tech does not care. They have the purchasing capacity to buy IPv4 subnets and charge for IPs. The biggest ISPs in North America charge up to $14 per month per IP address.So, the IPv4 addresses would not get cheaper within the next 5-6 years, I guess...
 
Completely agree with the previous commenter.
In the next, I would even say, 10 years, the situation will only get worse.
This is due to the fact that, firstly, contrary to statements, not all blocks have been distributed at zero, and secondly, the fact that a lot of blocks are in the hands of those who received them in huge quantities at the very dawn of the Internet and now they are either lying gathering dust, or thrown into the speculative market.

In general, my opinion is that RIPE should conduct a complete inventory of all blocks for their use and who owns them, and then, according to the precepts of Marx and Engels, "redistribute in favor of the poor" :))
 
As a hosting company, we are now trying to encourage our users to use IPv6, because indeed IPv4 has become so expensive. it raises the price of even our most affordable devices.
 
It is the customers and applicants, not the web hosting companies themselves, who determine supply and demand! The extensive infrastructure to access IPv6 has not yet been fully provided in the world, and therefore the demand for IPv4 is still high & when demand is high and supply is low, prices skyrocket!
 
IPv4 prices seem to be going down now that the demand has lifted from the COVID times though. You can get a /24 block for less than $100 dollars on some renter marketplaces and the price to purchase has decreased as well.
 
hostingbot said:
IPv4 prices seem to be going down now that the demand has lifted from the COVID times though. You can get a /24 block for less than $100 dollars on some renter marketplaces and the price to purchase has decreased as well.
Click to expand...
It is true, the demand for ips rental has also dropped a lot, I don't know if it has to do with ipxo and others al
 
While there might be fluctuations in the IPv4 market, there's currently no reason to think price could drop in the long run. It's a matter of scarcity more than offer and demand.

IPv6 is light years away to be adopted. I remember attending a RIPE conference back in 2012, it was all about the urgency of migrating to IPv6: twelve years later nothing has changed.

They say there are too many factors against abandoning IPv4, from less developed countries not having the tech resources, to enterprises not able to afford the transition in their local networks.

But IMHO, the main reason is that the current IPv4 space is still enough for the years to come: access providers more and more switch to NAT assigning unroutable ip addresses to customers and service providers are more careful about wasting assignments.
 
People adapt. We evolve and modify things to make them work for our current needs. An example of this is years ago you had to have a dedicated IP for each SSL, now you can have as many as you want for 1 IP.

NAT has become so wide spread that a single public IP can host hundreds if not potentially thousands of internal IPS.

From a time where a dedicated IP was needed for most things, things have evolved. As a hosting provider, we have seen things evolve from customers needing multiple IPs for services, to customers being able to use a single IP for everything. This is especially true for providers who charge for IPs.

In the background I do see a shift towards IPv6. However, like upback stated, we are still lightyears away from a full ipv6 internet.

Until we run out of ways to reduce the need of more IPv4 we will not be forced to adopt IPv6. It boils down to convenience and cost. Until the cost outweighs the convenience, we will continue on the same course. And being that most small companies cannot afford to buy large blocks, the market remains in the hands of large corporations.
 
Most things today can probably be deployed with IPv6 and just a 6to4/4to6 translation layer at the edge.

If I don't need email or am using a smarthost, almost everything I deploy now is just single-stack IPv6. It makes things simple IMHO.

One notable callout that's probably only relevant to hosts is the KernelCare patch servers are IPv4 only. You can use NAT64 or NAT44 but then every license shows up with the same IPv4 address, which is annoying.
 
IPv4 Is in high demand at this moment. There are my companies that are buying and leasing these precious networks. This is a complex discussion for sure, there are many ways this discussion can go.
 
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