Why have we not run out of ip addresses?

Question

With the massive growth in internet devices, shouldn’t we have used up all possible ipv4 numbers?

In: Technology

Answer 1

There’s a thing called carrier grade NAT (Network Address Translation) that enables ISPs to transparently share single IP addresses across many clients.

It does this by mapping a set of ports for each client to the single IP address (like a switchboard, if you will), and the router (the brains of the network) knows which port belongs to who, and forwards the data on accordingly.

Alternatively, some places may be switching over to full IPV6, therefore freeing up IPv4 address space.

Additionally, the governing body of the Internet address space IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) is able to shift around the number blocks as needed between countries, including take them off you if you aren’t using them.