Cisco SD-WAN Valuable Features
OM
reviewer1576422
Managing Partner at a consultancy with 11-50 employees
In terms of technology, we are completely agnostic. In many cases, we deal with Cisco simply due to the fact that the client already has a Cisco implementation. Most of the clients started their corporate deployment 10 or 15 years ago, and therefore there are legacy systems. Some of them are built on Cisco and we found that their systems are already implemented.
I evaluate new technologies continuously each month and we deploy, as I told you, across geographies in multiple companies. Cisco is definitely cutting edge, absolutely cutting edge in terms of robustness on the capability of the network to be very stable with very low delay. It is a proven, tried, and tested technology. It is very reliable software. It is rock solid and very stable with respect to delivering top-performance networking functions.
It is very stable with very good firmware. In terms of traditional functionality, it's unbeatable as an offer. I would say 10 plus as a vote in terms of traditional networking.
ER
Eliot Robinson
Executive Vice President Operations and IT at Sterling National Bank
Because our client uses two different ISPs at each location, the service is always up. The chances of Comcast going down at the same time that Verizon Files goes down is very, very small. The result is that the client's services are always up with much higher speeds and much lower costs. I think that those benefits are the ones that people are primarily interested in and that is what SD-WAN allowed us to achieve.
View full review »The best feature is SD-WAN's automation capabilities. I believe many customers don't care whether we use VPN, or that use color or mGRE. When you're talking about management of, for example, a DMVPN solution or MDI solution, what is the option? So we have to go to a bug-by-bug report, like for example, NSRP to show these things. With vManage, we can see everything. We have a graph that we can click on and it helps us to remember better.
Another good feature in the HCI is the integration of a health monitoring system. Other solutions like SDx are all the same. They have an integrated health monitoring system. So if you are deploying a data center, the options aren't really that great. But this integrated health system in HCI in vManage or even SD-WAN in the vManage is helping a lot. And also
Customizing SD-WAN is very easy because you can define two colors. You can define two different operators. You can deploy a partial mesh, a full mesh, or hub-and-spoke totally differently. If you want to do this on a DMVPN solution, that's really hard. Also, things like Quality of Service in mGRE environment, in my opinion, are very hard because when you are dealing with mGRE, you have one tunnel at the hub and a different tunnel at the spoke. So what if I want to limit the traffic in my hub at the spoke? Because I have one tunnel, all the branches will be affected if I implement a limitation or restriction. So that's why we have advanced technology, like adaptive quality of service. With SD-WAN, the QoS is much easier because it is separate from the VPN.
The very beauty of SD-WAN is the separation of the plane. Right now, there are different planes. Compared to other solutions, the whole thing is totally changed. Rebound and vManage came into play as well as the new protocols like PnP. I started to convert most of the solutions from regular DMVPN into SD-WAN because we have the capability to define our VPN or define our color and customize by making a full or partial image.
Buyer's Guide
Cisco SD-WAN
August 2022

Learn what your peers think about Cisco SD-WAN. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: August 2022.
620,987 professionals have used our research since 2012.
From my observations, Cisco has been rolling out new features every other day, so I would say their speed of innovation is one of the most valuable aspects for me.
I would also point to their superior features when it comes to general connectivity, configuration, and reporting.
View full review »DM
reviewer1156254
Network Operations Manager at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
The orchestration on the VPN connection between remote locations is a fantastic feature. I used it some time ago.
View full review »AS
reviewer1584468
Lead BD,Global ICT & transformation at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
If I have to give a neutral view of all the SD-WAN platforms that I have known so far, Cisco is good in routing.
The solution does not offer WAN optimization.
View full review »LD
reviewer935298
Head of Network Service, Information's Communications Technologies and Development at a transportation company with 1,001-5,000 employees
The solution is excellent mainly for supporting our two WAN ports. We can dedicate which WAN is taking over and which one is available or not. It's great that we can also connect them to the internet. We can have a third line to connect to the internet providers for our internet solution. Everything is redundant and everything is working so far.
Overall, it's been working well for us.
The solution is great at aggregating the traffic and then sending it in one direction.
We have a good knowledge base in-house and good support in general and therefore we have continued to use it over the years.
The product can scale well.
The solution is very stable.
View full review »UR
reviewer1741488
Consulting & Solution Integration at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
One of the most valuable features is that they have multiple SD-WAN options: you have Meraki for simple management solutions, you have Viptela, and you have the option of having any type of WAN interfaces. Presently, you can also have a single combined solution for both WAN as well as for voice, so you can have a voice bundle as well. These are major unique points of this solution.
View full review »RJ
reviewer1079229
Senior Network Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
The application link selection, I would say, is quite useful.
The load sharing over the multiple links is great.
We like the centralized management and aggregation aspects.
Technology-wise, it's decent.
The solution is pretty stable.
You can easily scale the product.
They did a new interface of Cisco SD-WAN. It's good.
View full review »When we talk about SDN technologies, we are referring to user experience or customer experience. The complete solution is designed based on the services and the experience that we need our users to have with them.
This product offers the ability to utilize all of the access available in the market. Importantly, it does not affect the quality of the application. The best feature of this technology that is available to us is the ability to do better load-balancing. This is thanks to the deep inspection of the packets and of course, the forwarding of packets based on the application.
View full review »Being able to see the traffic in real-time and know what application you are consuming, together with the possibility of taking your requirements directly from the cloud, has been useful.
Load balancing is a feature that allows us to take the best of our links and distribute the load intelligently, always with an eye on the end-customer experience.
Being able to prioritize, according to the applications, the exit and entrance of the traffic in a dynamic way, unlike the current quality of service that is rigid and static, is a tremendous advantage as it is done according to demands in real-time, so the customer experience is always the best.
View full review »SP
Salvador Penalva
Telecom and Collaboration Manager at a construction company with 501-1,000 employees
Configuration interfaces are quite easy and intuitive. Being a part of the Cisco environment, Cisco SD-WAN is quite straightforward.
View full review »KS
reviewer1423878
Products & Solutions Manager at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
The first part that we like is that we can reuse certain hardware, which is a valuable asset. You can use hardware SKUs that already exist in the network.
The second part that we like is the integration with the cloud and the measurement of the cloud's quality. These are the two values that this solution gives as compared to other implementations that we have seen.
The solution works well in big environments. It's excellent for large enterprises with a high number of users.
The deployment is quite simple and straightforward.
The solution is stable.
Technical support has always been quite helpful. We are very happy with their level of service.
It's possible to scale the solution.
We've looked into the existing documentation and found it to be okay. It varies, however, they do offer documentation for their products.
Overall, I really like the whole technology.
View full review »PA
reviewer1420671
Pre-sales Engineer at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees
The idea of SD-WAN is very good and it's efficient.
You get security, all of the service you need, and it's easy to deploy.
It is a feature-rich product with a lot of components.
View full review »The security of the solution is pretty good.
We like the user interface. It's fairly easy to navigate.
The user experience is pretty good.
We've found that the solution is easy to deploy.
The solution is very popular with many vendors.
Overall, our experience has been very positive. So far, so good. We don't have many complaints about its capabilities.
View full review »DR
reviewer1657632
Vice President Of Services at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
All the features that they have in there have been great. The solution offers good quality of service, visibility, connectivity, and security. It's all of that stuff that makes it good. That is what's required.
Cisco is finding its footing in that area, and they're getting better.
For our team, the installation is pretty straightforward.
The solution can scale. We haven't had any issues doing so.
View full review »It's a complete solution with many security features.
It integrates well with other Cisco solutions.
View full review »AR
reviewer1097490
Network Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
The solution is good to use and easy to handle and manage from the centralized location or from the cloud.
This means that no engineer need visit the site to do configurations and it addresses maintenance and upgrade issues, something which frees us up to accomplish more.
ED
reviewer1113966
Director de Arquitecturas at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
The security features are very good. We really like the application routing, for example.
The initial setup is quite simple.
The solution offers very good documentation.
Technical support is quite helpful.
The product is very scalable.
There are a lot of exciting features coming out very soon which we are looking forward to working with.
View full review »It is really easy to deploy and use. It is also easy to use for failovers and designing solutions.
The rollout is really quick. It is easy to adjust and roll out.
View full review »SK
reviewer1433835
Executive Director at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees
It is very simple and easy to manage, compared to other methods.
View full review »The centralized management is the most important feature. We can monitor what is going on at every location in our network through just one center.
AN
reviewer1581828
Technical Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
This solution comes with comprehensive technical support.
View full review »AV
Andre Van Dalen
Network and Security Engineer at FrieslandCampina
The load sharing in the fabric and the cloud connectivity are both pretty flexible. The solution offers us the correct field mechanisms.
The solution is stable and reliable.
It can scale according to our needs.
View full review »SZ
reviewer1461459
Team Lead Network Infrastructure at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
The most valuable features are zero-disk provisioning and link load balancing on an application basis. In the case of link load balancing, if an application is not working properly on the primary link, it may be fine on the secondary one. This means that if the first link goes down then it may still be accessible, which is a very good feature.
View full review »The scalability is the most valuable feature.
View full review »The connectivity is great.
The dashboard is excellent.
It's a scalable solution.
The product is stable.
Technical support is very good.
View full review »DH
Dániel Halmai
Head of IT Network Division at Panorinformatika
I have found the solution's main features are its ability to be customized, network traffic classification, and has a wide range of features that can be set.
View full review »AG
reviewer1572669
Cisco Systems at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
I like the feature that lets you transfer from old devices to new devices without changing the hardware and subscription.
View full review »We looked at an SD-WAN service and Cisco was a vendor that provided termination of those services. We bought it and it met the specification. Cisco Viptela solution met the specification for our network.
View full review »SN
reviewer1193265
Senior Manager at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
The best feature about SD-WAN is the ability to consolidate the links to the branch and load-balance the traffic.
View full review »Cisco SD-WAN's best features are the development of network links, application control, and bandwidth monitoring.
View full review »ZT
reviewer1252953
Network Solutions Architect at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
The most valuable features are manageability, scalability, and simplicity.
View full review »The most valuable feature is the ease of central management. That is the main thing for us.
View full review »The integration of Layer 3 and application routing is great.
View full review »YY
reviewer1599519
Junior Solution Architect at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
I have found the performance and the Zero-Touch provisioning helpful which makes it easier for us to develop.
View full review »HA
reviewer1672659
Design Engineer at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Cisco SD-WAN is a very good product. It is difficult to highlight one specific feature.
AS
AshutoshSrivastava
Project Manager at Tachyon Broadband
Cisco SD-WAN's collaborative features are unique and sustainable. I also like the protocols, which use two SD-WAN.
View full review »The most valuable features in Cisco SD-WAN are the QoS, AI, and simple interface for users to access.
View full review »Cisco SD-WAN is highly secure.
View full review »Buyer's Guide
Cisco SD-WAN
August 2022

Learn what your peers think about Cisco SD-WAN. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: August 2022.
620,987 professionals have used our research since 2012.