Network Capacity Planning

What Does Network Capacity Planning Mean?

Network capacity planning is the process of planning a network for utilization, bandwidth, operations, availability and other network capacity constraints.

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It is a type of network or IT management process that assists network administrators in planning for network infrastructure and operations in line with current and future operations.

Techopedia Explains Network Capacity Planning

Network capacity planning is generally done to identify shortcomings or parameters that can affect the network’s performance or availability within a predictable future time, usually in years. Typically, network capacity planning requires information about:

  • Current network traffic volumes
  • Network utilization
  • Type of traffic
  • Capacity of current infrastructure

This analysis helps network administrators understand the maximum capability of current resources and the amount of new resources needed to cater to future requirements. In addition to technical network infrastructure, network capacity planning may also include planning for human resources that will manage and/or monitor the network.

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Margaret Rouse

Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email Margaret or contact her…