Abstract This study explores the propagation characteristics of ion-acoustic periodic, soliton, and breather waves in electron-positron-ion (EPI) plasma with a relativistic positron beam. The Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation is obtained by applying the traditional reductive perturbation method (RPM) to the fundamental set of fluid equations. When the KdV model is unable to accurately represent the nonlinear system's evolution, a modified Korteweg-de Vries (mKdV) equation is constructed. In both models, Jacobi elliptic functions are used to derive periodic solutions, and a connection between periodic waves and soliton solutions is established. Hirota's bilinear method is used to generate breathers directly from the KdV type framework without utilizing the modified Schrodinger framework inferred from the KdV type framework, which is a prevalent method in studies of nonlinear waves. Numerical knowledge of various physical factors in the ionospheric region is incorporated into the model to elucidate wave propagation in the Earth's upper atmosphere.