The distribution of IPv4 and IPv6 addresses by country shows the United States with the largest public IPv4 allocation: 1,606,208,928 addresses, or 43.56% of the 3,687,597,216 allocated across 239 countries and territories. Those totals reflect early internet registry allocations, when early adopters received large address blocks before global IPv4 exhaustion.
IPv4 and IPv6 addresses by country rankings
When you check IP address country statistics across global network registries, the distribution of internet protocol addresses is heavily concentrated among major economies. The top five countries control more than 65% of all active IPv4 address space worldwide. The ranking below lists the top 15 nations by allocated IPv4 addresses, alongside their allocated or assigned ASN and IPv6 delegation-record counts.
| # | Country Name | IPv4 Addresses | Global Share | ASN Delegation Records | IPv6 Delegation Records |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | United States (US) | 1,606,208,928 | 43.56% | 32,226 | 10,834 |
| 2 | China (CN) | 342,983,424 | 9.30% | 6,626 | 2,062 |
| 3 | Japan (JP) | 188,706,368 | 5.12% | 1,307 | 788 |
| 4 | United Kingdom (GB) | 138,785,792 | 3.76% | 3,141 | 2,049 |
| 5 | Germany (DE) | 126,333,056 | 3.43% | 3,250 | 3,115 |
| 6 | South Korea (KR) | 112,497,920 | 3.05% | 1,183 | 183 |
| 7 | France (FR) | 81,586,768 | 2.21% | 1,892 | 1,410 |
| 8 | Brazil (BR) | 79,320,832 | 2.15% | 9,169 | 8,962 |
| 9 | Canada (CA) | 67,885,824 | 1.84% | 2,515 | 1,141 |
| 10 | Italy (IT) | 54,085,248 | 1.47% | 1,318 | 1,070 |
| 11 | Netherlands (NL) | 47,954,720 | 1.30% | 1,613 | 1,936 |
| 12 | Australia (AU) | 46,090,304 | 1.25% | 3,001 | 1,741 |
| 13 | Russia (RU) | 45,220,416 | 1.23% | 5,767 | 2,184 |
| 14 | India (IN) | 42,015,488 | 1.14% | 6,296 | 2,926 |
| 15 | Taiwan (TW) | 35,739,904 | 0.97% | 480 | 324 |
| Total | 239 Countries Total | 3,687,597,216 | 100.00% | 122,763 | N/A |
Regional registry allocations and IPv4 exhaustion history
The global distribution of IP addresses is administered by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and delegated to five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs): the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) for North America, RIPE NCC for Europe and the Middle East, APNIC for Asia-Pacific, LACNIC for Latin America, and AFRINIC for Africa. During the early development of TCP/IP networking, large contiguous /8 IPv4 blocks (each containing 16,777,216 addresses) were assigned to universities, corporations, and government departments primarily located in North America.
As internet adoption expanded globally, the remaining pool of unallocated IPv4 addresses rapidly depleted. IANA allocated its final /8 blocks in February 2011, forcing regional registries to implement strict allocation policies and encouraging the adoption of Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) subnets. Today, new network operators must either purchase IPv4 addresses on the secondary transfer market or deploy IPv6 dual-stack infrastructure.
Country assignment metrics reflect the registered administrative country of the holding organization recorded in RIR WHOIS databases. In practice, large international telecoms and cloud hosters may announce portions of their address space across border networks, but the primary registration remains tied to the parent country entity.
Detailed country breakdowns and network density
Country totals show how registry records vary by region. The United States has 1,606,208,928 delegated IPv4 addresses and 32,226 ASN delegation records. China has 342,983,424 IPv4 addresses and 6,626 ASN delegation records. These figures describe registry records, not network infrastructure or subscribers.
In Europe, Germany (126,333,056 addresses; 3,250 ASN delegation records) and the United Kingdom (138,785,792 addresses; 3,141 ASN delegation records) host Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) such as DE-CIX in Frankfurt and LINX in London. Japan has 188,706,368 addresses across 1,307 ASN delegation records, while South Korea has 112,497,920 addresses across 1,183 ASN delegation records. These counts describe delegation records, not network density.
In Latin America, Brazil dominates regional network development with 79,320,832 IPv4 addresses and 9,169 ASN delegation records. The ASN delegation-record count does not identify the number of independent providers or their operating structure.
How we measured country IP address allocations
Our dataset is derived from daily published delegation statistics files maintained by the five Regional Internet Registries: ARIN, RIPE NCC, APNIC, LACNIC, and AFRINIC, as well as the Number Resource Organization (NRO) combined registry file. The measured date for this release is October 10, 2026.
For this country-by-country breakdown, we aggregate allocated or assigned IPv4 ranges, calculate address counts from CIDR mask lengths, and sum ASN delegation records registered under each ISO two-letter country code. For IPv6, because individual address counts are vast (a single /64 subnet contains 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 addresses), we measure network breadth using the count of allocated or assigned IPv6 delegation records; these records do not show BGP announcements or active routing.
Administrative country codes in WHOIS registries reflect legal organization headquarters, not real-time end-user geolocation. carrier-grade NAT (CGNAT) deployed by mobile network operators allows millions of cellular users to share smaller IPv4 pools, meaning total IP volume does not directly correlate with total internet population.
IPv6 prefix adoption versus legacy IPv4 concentration
IPv4 allocation figures show historical concentration in North America and Western Europe, IPv6 delegation records show the number of allocated or assigned prefix records by country; they do not establish routing or adoption. Brazil (BR) has 8,962 IPv6 delegation records and 9,169 ASN delegation records. These counts do not establish fiber broadband deployment across regional internet service providers.
India (IN) has 2,926 IPv6 delegation records across 6,296 ASN delegation records. This registry record count does not measure mobile network deployment or IPv6 transition rates.
Germany has 3,115 IPv6 delegation records and France has 1,410. These counts do not measure dual-stack deployment, resilience, or user latency.
Verifying country IP locations and next steps
Address distribution can help explain why a public IP location points to a particular country or network provider. Registry data records network ownership when you inspect your connection or a remote address.
To inspect any specific IPv4 or IPv6 address and determine its holding organization, ASN, and country registration, use our free IP lookup tool. If you suspect your connection is routing through an unexpected location or intermediate server, check our proxy and VPN check tool. For more on IP addresses and location accuracy, read our guides on public vs private IP addresses and why IP location can be wrong.