Virtual WAN - Overview

Azure Virtual WAN is a networking service that brings together networking, security, and routing capabilities into a single operational interface. This service provides optimized and automated branch connectivity to Azure. It acts as a network transit hub that you can use to manage the connectivity of your on-premises datacenters, remote offices, and inter-VR (Virtual Network) connectivity.

Key Features

Simplified Branch Connectivity: Connect your on-premises branch offices to Azure securely and efficiently.
Centralized Network Management: Manage your global network from a single pane of glass.
Scalable and Resilient: Built on Azure's global infrastructure for high availability and performance.
Advanced Security: Integrate with Azure Firewall and Network Security Groups for robust security.
Optimized Routing: Automatic, dynamic route propagation for seamless inter-site and site-to-network connectivity.

Use Cases

Virtual WAN is ideal for organizations with a distributed set of branch offices that need to connect to Azure resources and potentially to each other. Common scenarios include:

Connecting multiple remote offices to Azure Virtual Networks.
Establishing a hub-and-spoke network topology.
Migrating on-premises workloads to Azure.
Implementing a secure and scalable global WAN.

Getting Started

To begin using Azure Virtual WAN, you will need an Azure subscription. You can create a Virtual WAN resource in the Azure portal and then proceed to configure your connections.

Important Note

Virtual WAN requires a Virtual WAN hub, which is a regional deployment of Virtual WAN. You can have multiple hubs in different regions to optimize connectivity for your globally distributed users and applications.

Explore the following tutorials to learn how to deploy and manage your Azure Virtual WAN:

                
# Example: Creating a Virtual WAN resource using Azure CLI
az network vwan create --name MyVirtualWAN --resource-group MyResourceGroup --location eastus

Tip

Consider the regions where your users and applications are located when deploying Virtual WAN hubs. Placing hubs closer to your resources can significantly improve performance and reduce latency.

For more in-depth information, please refer to the official Azure Virtual WAN documentation.