Unicast is communication between a single sender and a single receiver over a network. The term exists in contradistinction to multicast, communication between a single sender and multiple receivers, and anycast, communication between any sender and the nearest of a group of receivers in a network. An earlier term, point-to-point communication, is similar in meaning to unicast. The new Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) supports unicast as well as anycast and multicast.