Same as always, let’s be clear about who we are first: Yuxinan is a multi-site networking product made by Siwenlide, and we are an interested party in this article. This piece is not a ranking; it answers a heavily searched question whose online answers are mostly half-right: does multi-site networking actually require a public IP address? In one sentence: In 2026, no. Needing a public IP is an approach from over a decade ago; the new generation of networking runs on P2P direct connections plus cloud relay, so both sides can sit on private networks and still connect.
1. Why Is Everyone Suddenly Asking This Question?
Because public IPv4 addresses are essentially no longer handed out. Years ago, when you signed up for broadband, you could get a public IP just by asking your carrier; today home and ordinary business broadband defaults to a “large private network” (carrier-grade NAT), and the WAN address you receive is a private address starting with 10 or 100.64. Want a static public IP? In most regions you have to sign up for a government/enterprise leased-line service, pay separately, and approval is not guaranteed.
So many business owners get stuck right here: they have opened two or three stores and want to link up the POS, surveillance, and inventory systems, but when they look up networking options, the first line of every old online tutorial is “apply for a public IP first” — and when that application fails, the whole thing stalls.
2. What the Old Public-IP Approaches Cost You
Laying out the old approaches is not meant to put them down — it is so you understand who originally posed the question “do you need a public IP?”
- Port mapping (port forwarding): map an internal service to a port on a public IP address at the router. The prerequisite is having a public IP, plus knowing how to configure the router; the bigger problem is security — a mapped port effectively hangs your service on the public internet, where internet-wide scanners knock every day, and that is exactly how POS systems and cameras with weak passwords get breached.
- Traditional dial-up VPN: at least one end must have a public IP to act as the server, with the other sites dialing in. If neither end has a public IP, you have to rent an additional cloud server with a public address as a relay, and both configuration and maintenance require someone who knows what they are doing.
- Leased line: the carrier runs a point-to-point circuit, which has nothing to do with public IPs. It is genuinely stable and genuinely expensive, billed monthly, and suited to banks and large chains rather than a small business with a few stores.
What these three paths share: you either pay for an address, pay for a circuit, or pay for maintenance. That is where the impression that “multi-site networking is expensive” comes from — it describes the old technology, not today’s prices.
3. The Approach That Doesn’t Need a Public IP, Explained in One Sentence
When you video-call a relative in another city on WeChat, have you ever thought about it: your home is on a private network, theirs is too, neither of you has a public IP, and the video call still goes through. It comes down to two things: P2P hole punching — with the help of a public “rendezvous point,” the two sides find each other directly, traffic does not pass through a third party, and data moves peer to peer; and when hole punching fails in certain network environments, it automatically falls back to a cloud relay — forwarded through a cloud server, with bandwidth according to your plan, and it still works.
The new generation of multi-site networking (Yuxinan included) follows exactly this idea: the devices at both ends sit on private networks, neither has a public IP, no port mapping is performed, and they interconnect as soon as they are powered on. With no ports exposed to the public internet, scanners cannot even find the door, which makes it an order of magnitude more secure than port mapping.
4. Find Your Case: Which Situation Is Your Network In?
| Your situation | Old approach | New approach (P2P + relay) |
|---|---|---|
| Neither side has a public IP (most common) | Port mapping is a non-starter; a traditional VPN requires renting an extra cloud server as a relay | Works right away; in most cases a direct P2P connection, falling back to the relay automatically when it cannot connect |
| Only headquarters has a public IP | Doable: port mapping or a VPN server, but it needs someone to maintain it | Works, and there is no need to expose that public IP |
| Already have a leased line and want to cut costs | A leased line itself does not depend on a public IP, but the monthly fee is high | Ordinary broadband plus networking can replace it or serve as a backup link, cutting costs by an order of magnitude |
5. Without a Public IP, Do Speed and Security Take a Hit?
Speed: with a direct P2P connection, traffic runs between the two points without passing a third party, so bandwidth is capped only by your broadband at both ends, with no extra overhead; only when hole punching fails and traffic goes through the relay are you limited by your plan’s forwarding bandwidth. For small-packet workloads such as POS, membership, and ERP, either mode is more than enough; surveillance backhaul depends more on a direct connection, but once you configure “preview over the substream,” relay bandwidth is sufficient too.
Security: everything is encrypted end to end, and private keys never leave your devices; and because no port mapping is used, there is simply no attack surface on the public internet. By contrast, port mapping opens a door in plain sight and then counts on the lock being strong, while an approach that opens no holes at all leaves outsiders unable to even see the door.
6. How to Verify That You Don’t Need a Public IP
Don’t take any vendor’s word for it — test it yourself: the Yuxinan free trial version is ?0 forever, activated upon registration, and includes a quota of 2 endpoints (the quota includes hardware). Plug both ends into ordinary broadband, without touching the router or applying for anything, and if the POS system at the branch office can reach the machine at headquarters within ten minutes, that proves this path works for your network. Once two stores are up and running and you want to expand to three or more, see the boundary between the free and paid versions and how to work out the one-year total; the complete cost ledger for 30 stores is in the cost accounting for chain-store networking, and the product’s six pricing tiers are published long term on the Yuxinan official website.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How do I check whether my broadband has a public IP?
A: Log in to your router and look at the WAN address, then search “IP” on Baidu and compare. If the two addresses match, you have a public IP; if the router shows an address starting with 10.x, 100.64.x, or 172.16–31.x, you are on the carrier’s large private network and have no public IPv4.
Q: Does hole punching always succeed?
A: In the vast majority of broadband environments a direct connection works. In a few environments with multi-layer NAT or strict firewalls it cannot get through, and traffic automatically goes through the cloud relay — the functionality still works, only the forwarding bandwidth follows your plan. The free version relays at 2 Mbps, which is enough to validate POS and ERP.
Q: Will the lack of a public IP affect surveillance playback?
A: No. Live preview uses the substream and takes very little bandwidth; only playback pulls the main stream. For stores with many cameras, we recommend setting “substream for preview, main stream for playback,” which saves more than half the bandwidth.
Q: If my carrier gives me a public IP later, is this still useful?
A: Yes. It never depended on a public IP in the first place, and having one does not conflict with it; and the security advantage of not exposing any ports remains.
The technical principles in this article are plain-language explanations of publicly known concepts; the prices of the Yuxinan free and paid versions are subject to the pages published on its official website as of October 2026.
