In packet-switched networks, routers decide which direction, which neighbour to forward packets to. To make these decisions they need to know the network topology more or less. Routing protocols play an important role in gathering knowledge of complex network topologies since routers can share topological information with each other this way.

IPv4 and IPv6 routing protocols are very similar but there are differences between them. This presentation discusses the IPv6 unicast routing protocols in use today, their new features and the differences compared to their IPv4 counterparts.