BGP Stability Trends in 2025: Analyzing IPv4 and IPv6 Routing Challenges

According to APNIC’s Geoff Huston, the stability of the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) continued to evolve throughout 2025, highlighting key trends in update rates, routing convergence, and the relative instability between IPv4 and IPv6 protocols. The latest annual data revealed a steady but nuanced profile of update activity across both protocols, with specific attention to the skewed distribution of unstable prefixes and the increasing role of traffic engineering practices.

BGP Update Trends: Insights from 2025 Data

BGP, the backbone routing protocol of the Internet, relies on dynamic updates to ensure stable connectivity. Huston’s report shows that from mid-2009 to early 2026, the total number of advertised IPv4 prefixes quadrupled from 300,000 to 1.2 million. Despite this, the number of observed daily withdrawal messages remained surprisingly stable, fluctuating between 18,000 to 25,000 since 2023. Contrarily, the average daily update count rose, suggesting a growing need for more updates to achieve path convergence.

IPv6, on the other hand, exhibited higher instability. Huston’s analysis identified exponential growth in the dynamic update rate, doubling across 2025. Interestingly, IPv6 updates often stem from about 10% of advertised prefixes, a marked contrast to IPv4’s steadier figures. The convergence times for unstable prefixes stabilized at 40-50 seconds across both protocols, reflecting some consistency despite changing dynamics in topology growth.

Why BGP Stability Matters: Market and Technological Implications

BGP stability is vital for ensuring Internet performance, scalability, and security. The findings highlight potential scaling challenges for IPv6, whose instability could strain network operators and transit providers. Industry-wide, the increasing adoption of IPv6—driven by IPv4 exhaustion—underscores the urgency for refined BGP systems capable of managing its noisier and exponentially expanding routing tables.

Additionally, rising instability in both IPv6 and IPv4 has implications for cross-border connectivity, where large-scale transit networks like Cogent, Lumen Technologies, and NTT Communications play a critical role. The reliance on a small subset of ‘noisy’ prefixes and Autonomous System Numbers (ASNs) for most updates—70% of IPv6 updates in December 2025 came from just 0.1% of ASNs—indicates network inefficiencies requiring targeted solutions.

For competitors in the space, such as software-defined networking (SDN) companies and BGP optimization platforms, this growing instability represents a significant opportunity. Solutions addressing IPv6’s noisier topology or enabling better traffic management through BGP policies could gain rapid traction.

Expert Analysis: The Road Ahead for BGP and IPv6

Industry experts have mixed reactions to the data. While the overall stability of BGP remains sustainable, questions linger about IPv6’s growth trajectories. The prominence of traffic engineering updates—accounting for nearly 70% of daily changes—points to a tradeoff between converged routing and finer-grained control over traffic flows. Optimization strategies, such as refining the Minimum Route Advertisement Interval (MRAI), could mitigate the update surge but may increase operational complexity.

“IPv6’s noisy dynamic reinforces the importance of operational vigilance,” said Dr. Lisa Cheng, a network scientist specializing in routing optimization. “Routing operators must adopt advanced monitoring tools and AI-driven dynamic routing protocols to minimize instability and latency risks.”

Moving forward, the growth of IPv6 usage by organizations—such as Teknotel Telecommunications (Turkey), Zscaler (US), and VirtuaSYS (France)—suggests that broader market adoption will test the protocol’s scalability. Innovations in multiprotocol label switching (MPLS), SD-WAN, and AI routing optimization could be key to navigating these challenges effectively.

Conclusion: Will IPv6 Reach Stability?

While BGP remains vital and largely stable, IPv6 presents unique challenges that the industry must address as its adoption grows. Operators should monitor ASN-driven instability, design for better routing efficiency, and consider disruptive technologies to achieve greater coherence.

What do you think about IPv6’s long-term growth? Will the industry adapt to its noisier dynamics, or are we moving toward a routing bottleneck? Share your insights below.