diff --git a/transport-native-epoll/src/test/java/io/netty/channel/epoll/LinuxSocketTest.java b/transport-native-epoll/src/test/java/io/netty/channel/epoll/LinuxSocketTest.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..00d2afb687
--- /dev/null
+++ b/transport-native-epoll/src/test/java/io/netty/channel/epoll/LinuxSocketTest.java
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+/*
+ * Copyright 2020 The Netty Project
+ *
+ * The Netty Project licenses this file to you under the Apache License,
+ * version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+ * with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at:
+ *
+ *   http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+ *
+ * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+ * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT
+ * WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the
+ * License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations
+ * under the License.
+ */
+package io.netty.channel.epoll;
+
+import org.junit.BeforeClass;
+import org.junit.Test;
+
+import java.io.IOException;
+import java.net.InetAddress;
+import java.net.InetSocketAddress;
+
+import static org.junit.Assume.assumeTrue;
+
+public class LinuxSocketTest {
+    @BeforeClass
+    public static void loadJNI() {
+        assumeTrue(Epoll.isAvailable());
+    }
+
+    @Test(expected = IOException.class)
+    public void testBindNonIpv6SocketToInet6AddressThrows() throws Exception {
+        LinuxSocket socket = LinuxSocket.newSocketStream(false);
+        try {
+            socket.bind(new InetSocketAddress(InetAddress.getByAddress(
+                    new byte[]{'0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '1'}), 0));
+        } finally {
+            socket.close();
+        }
+    }
+
+    @Test(expected = IOException.class)
+    public void testConnectNonIpv6SocketToInet6AddressThrows() throws Exception {
+        LinuxSocket socket = LinuxSocket.newSocketStream(false);
+        try {
+            socket.connect(new InetSocketAddress(InetAddress.getByAddress(
+                    new byte[]{'0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '1'}), 1234));
+        } finally {
+            socket.close();
+        }
+    }
+}
diff --git a/transport-native-unix-common/src/main/java/io/netty/channel/unix/Socket.java b/transport-native-unix-common/src/main/java/io/netty/channel/unix/Socket.java
index 10a68d4b34..f5459eacf2 100644
--- a/transport-native-unix-common/src/main/java/io/netty/channel/unix/Socket.java
+++ b/transport-native-unix-common/src/main/java/io/netty/channel/unix/Socket.java
@@ -55,6 +55,13 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
         this.ipv6 = isIPv6(fd);
     }
 
+    /**
+     * Returns {@code true} if we should use IPv6 internally, {@code false} otherwise.
+     */
+    private boolean useIpv6(InetAddress address) {
+        return ipv6 || address instanceof Inet6Address;
+    }
+
     public final void shutdown() throws IOException {
         shutdown(true, true);
     }
@@ -117,7 +124,7 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
             scopeId = 0;
             address = ipv4MappedIpv6Address(addr.getAddress());
         }
-        int res = sendTo(fd, ipv6, buf, pos, limit, address, scopeId, port);
+        int res = sendTo(fd, useIpv6(addr), buf, pos, limit, address, scopeId, port);
         if (res >= 0) {
             return res;
         }
@@ -141,7 +148,7 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
             scopeId = 0;
             address = ipv4MappedIpv6Address(addr.getAddress());
         }
-        int res = sendToAddress(fd, ipv6, memoryAddress, pos, limit, address, scopeId, port);
+        int res = sendToAddress(fd, useIpv6(addr), memoryAddress, pos, limit, address, scopeId, port);
         if (res >= 0) {
             return res;
         }
@@ -164,7 +171,7 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
             scopeId = 0;
             address = ipv4MappedIpv6Address(addr.getAddress());
         }
-        int res = sendToAddresses(fd, ipv6, memoryAddress, length, address, scopeId, port);
+        int res = sendToAddresses(fd, useIpv6(addr), memoryAddress, length, address, scopeId, port);
         if (res >= 0) {
             return res;
         }
@@ -215,8 +222,9 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
         int res;
         if (socketAddress instanceof InetSocketAddress) {
             InetSocketAddress inetSocketAddress = (InetSocketAddress) socketAddress;
-            NativeInetAddress address = NativeInetAddress.newInstance(inetSocketAddress.getAddress());
-            res = connect(fd, ipv6, address.address, address.scopeId, inetSocketAddress.getPort());
+            InetAddress inetAddress = inetSocketAddress.getAddress();
+            NativeInetAddress address = NativeInetAddress.newInstance(inetAddress);
+            res = connect(fd, useIpv6(inetAddress), address.address, address.scopeId, inetSocketAddress.getPort());
         } else if (socketAddress instanceof DomainSocketAddress) {
             DomainSocketAddress unixDomainSocketAddress = (DomainSocketAddress) socketAddress;
             res = connectDomainSocket(fd, unixDomainSocketAddress.path().getBytes(CharsetUtil.UTF_8));
@@ -255,8 +263,9 @@ public class Socket extends FileDescriptor {
     public final void bind(SocketAddress socketAddress) throws IOException {
         if (socketAddress instanceof InetSocketAddress) {
             InetSocketAddress addr = (InetSocketAddress) socketAddress;
-            NativeInetAddress address = NativeInetAddress.newInstance(addr.getAddress());
-            int res = bind(fd, ipv6, address.address, address.scopeId, addr.getPort());
+            InetAddress inetAddress = addr.getAddress();
+            NativeInetAddress address = NativeInetAddress.newInstance(inetAddress);
+            int res = bind(fd, useIpv6(inetAddress), address.address, address.scopeId, addr.getPort());
             if (res < 0) {
                 throw newIOException("bind", res);
             }