Measuring Cellular IPv6 Networks for Web Performance

The growing numbers of mobile users challenge cellular network scalability. The IPv4 address space is not sufficiently large to uniquely identify all active network devices, while at the same time network address translation (NAT) middleboxes used to extend the IPv4 address space introduce performance overheads. Therefore, ISPs have started to adopt IPv6 addressing to provide Internet services to their growing user base. However, the impact of adopting IPv6 on Web performance is not yet well understood. In this study, we perform the first large scale investigation of the deployment of IPv6 infrastructure across cellular networks in the US and compare Web performance over IPv6 and IPv4 networks. Results from our measurements indicate that providing Web content over IPv6 does not degrade Web performance, and in some cases, IPv6 speeds up user communication. We therefore argue that server and application support for IPv6 has the potential to improve the Web performance for end-users.