With holiday shopping deals in full swing, you may have taken the opportunity to buy a shiny new smartphone or connected device.  Activating your new device requires a unique phone number, which becomes your digital address for calls and messages.  To keep up with growing demand, many cities introduce new area codes alongside familiar ones, ensuring everyone, including yourself, can get a number. 

A similar challenge exists on the internet, where the supply of available Internet Protocol (IP) addresses is running out as more devices come online. As your organization’s cloud network grows, it’s essential to plan for sufficient address capacity for all your resources. To meet this need, we are pleased to announce Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) API Gateway support for IPv6 and Reserved IPs.

With this new feature, you can now create API Gateways with IPv6 addresses and reserve IPv4 addresses for reliable, consistent connectivity even as gateways are rebuilt or updated. This enhancement keeps your network accessible and scalable as connectivity demands grow.

What is IPv6?

IPv6, or Internet Protocol version 6, is the latest standard for connecting devices over the internet. While the older IPv4 system uses 32-bit addresses and can support about 4.3 billion unique addresses, the rapid growth of connected devices means we are running out of available addresses.

IPv6 solves this problem by using 128-bit addresses, which increases the total number of possible addresses to an almost unlimited 340 undecillion (a 1 followed by 36 zeros)! This massive expansion ensures your business can easily scale your networks, support future growth, and avoid running into address shortages as more devices come online.

What are Reserved IPs

Reserved IPs for API Gateway are specific IP addresses set up in advance which exist outside the lifetime of a gateway.  On gateway creation, a reserved IP can be associated with the API Gateway. Unlike dynamically assigned IPs, a reserved IP remains constant even if the gateway is rebuilt.

This is important because a reserved IP provides a stable and predictable address for your clients and systems to connect to, ensuring uninterrupted access as your infrastructure changes. It simplifies DNS management, supports seamless fail over for high availability, and enhances security by allowing you to control which IP ranges can access your API Gateway. These benefits are crucial for maintaining reliable, secure, and manageable access to your critical API services as your cloud network evolves.

How it works for you

Here are three key use cases for IPv6 and Reserved IPs to help you enhance your network and scalability:

  • Transitioning to IPv4 and IPv6: Create a new dual stack API Gateway with support for both IPv4 and IPv6 clients and enable compatibility across your applications as your network evolves.
  • Reserve IPs to maintain availability during migration: Reserve an IPv4 address to simplify DNS management and maintain a consistent endpoint for clients as you update or replace your API Gateway.
  • Dedicated IPv6 Gateway: Deploy a single stack IPv6 API Gateway to prepare for increased growth and to simplify your network.

Automate IPv6 and Reserved IPs with your preferred language

You can now manage API Gateway IPv6 addresses and reserved IPs using the OCI CLI, SDKs, and Terraform provider. It is fully automatable and supported across Python, Java, .NET, Go, TypeScript, Ruby, and PowerShell. 

Add IPv6 support to your API Gateway today

To learn more about Oracle Cloud Infrastructures’ API Gateway, see the following resources: