Policy-based networking enables network managers to optimize traffic routing by providing visibility into the health of network links. The system acts on the information to decide the optimal traffic routing, including viewing the data in real-time or in historical trends. Using these insights, network managers can make informed decisions and minimize operational costs.

Also, SD-WAN vendors provide policy-based networking that enables businesses to achieve the highest operational bandwidth while reducing overall costs. It also automates traffic steering in an application-driven manner, resulting in sub-second failover. However, a policy-based networking solution can be challenging since it involves many different factors.

High availability

SD-WAN uses a policy-based networking model to manage multiple independent topologies for varying applications that will abstract the complexity of WAN topologies, allowing the controller to make decisions on a global or path-by-path basis. This method is ideal for cloud applications requiring local internet access rather than backhauling traffic, which deploys these controllers in different on-prem locations or other cloud regions. In either case, each SD-WAN device references the vBond orchestrator using a single FQDN name.

In addition to providing high availability and increased network capacity, SD-WAN also offers centralized management and visibility of the network. And unlike MPLS, SD-WAN supports multiple connection types.

Low latency

SD-WAN is a network architecture designed for businesses with low bandwidth needs. It works with any transport provider and configures to optimize network performance. Addition, it can reduce bandwidth consumption and costs by consolidating branch offices.

SD-WAN can maintain high-quality business-critical applications. This networking technology provides the best route based on policies defining network architecture. The SD-WAN platform also enables proactive policy management and monitoring of network conditions. Network managers can better respond to changes in real-time and avoid security breaches.

Security

Security policy-based networking is an essential aspect of SD-WAN, enabling enterprises to deploy a unified security strategy across a diverse network of locations. This approach allows IT departments to monitor network traffic and ports to detect threats. In addition, this centralized security management makes it easier to deploy critical updates and patches across an environment. Security policies are also easily rolled out across the network, making them even more effective. But while centralized security management is an essential feature of SD-WAN, its real power comes from the technology built into the network.

Organizations need to ensure a high level of security to get the most out of this networking solution. It is essential to implement enterprise-grade security. SD-WAN routes traffic over multiple locations, and security monitoring tools may not be able to see everything. Different branch locations may have other security solutions.

Single pane of glass management

Software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN) is a virtualized networking management solution that sits over enterprise-wide area networks (WANs). It provides branch offices, distributed workforces, and remote workers with access to corporate resources and applications. By decoupling the control layer from hardware, SD-WAN provides global, granular control and unifies network policy. The benefits of SD-WAN management are two-fold: it offers international, refined, and consistent control no matter where the device is.

SD-WAN delivers high availability, low latency, and dynamic traffic routing. It also provides secure access to applications, data, and services no matter where the users are. In addition, SD-WAN’s software intelligence also makes it possible to access applications from any location securely. It also offers a single pane of glass management and cloud-based operations management.

Application policy-based policies

Application policy-based policies in SD-WAN allow you to control which network traffic you can forward for data and voice traffic. You can configure them to have different priorities for each traffic type. For example, you may want to prioritize VoIP traffic. In addition, application policy-based policies help you control the speed of forwarding VoIP traffic.

Application-based policies use SLA (service level agreements) parameters to prioritize network traffic. You can set up the traffic type profile to adhere to a specific threshold or a default SLA. Additionally, traffic can be switched based on SLA failover standards.