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.
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.