How many unique IP addresses can IPv4 support?

IPv4 (Internet Protocol version 4) utilizes a 32-bit address space for IP addresses. This means that the total number of unique addresses available in IPv4 can be calculated as (2^{32}).

When you compute (2^{32}), the result is 4,294,967,296. Therefore, IPv4 can support a total of 4,294,967,296 unique IP addresses. This large number illustrates the capacity of the IPv4 addressing scheme, which has historically catered to a vast number of devices connected to the internet.

Understanding this fundamental aspect of IPv4's structure is crucial, especially given that as devices proliferate, we have seen a greater demand for IP addresses, leading to the eventual transition to IPv6, which can accommodate an even larger number due to its 128-bit address length.