[Kumbukani Mwambembe]

IPv4 has remained in use longer than expected due to Network Address Translation (NAT), which conserves IP addresses by allowing multiple devices on a private network to share a single public IP. However, IPv4 is unsustainable due to key limitations, primarily address exhaustion from its 32-bit address space, which supports only 4.3 billion unique IP addresses. Workarounds like NAT add complexity and reduce efficiency. Additionally, IPv4 struggles to scale as the number of internet-connected devices grows. IPv6, with its 128-bit address space, resolves these issues by providing vastly more addresses, better scalability, and improved security.