Setting Up BIRD 2 for BGP: Announce Your Own IPv6 Prefix in 2026

BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) is the routing protocol that makes the internet work. If you have your own ASN and IP prefix, you can announce your addresses to the world using BIRD 2 — the most popular open-source BGP routing daemon on Linux. In this guide, I'll walk through setting up BIRD 2 to announce an IPv6 prefix via BGP with your upstream provider. Prerequisites A server running Linux (Ubuntu 22.04/24.04 or Debian 12) Your own ASN (Autonomous System Number) An IPv6 prefix (at least /48) A BGP-capable upstream provider or IX membership Getting an ASN and IP space : You'll need to work with a Local Internet Registry (LIR) to obtain an ASN and IP prefix. For example, NoPKT LLC provides ASN registration and IPv6 allocation services through ARIN — they handled our setup in about a week, which is much faster than going through the ARIN process directly. Step 1: Install BIRD 2 sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y bird2 Verify the installation: bird --version # BIRD 2.14 (or newer) Ste