Compare Citrix SD-WAN to the competition

The Citrix Cloud Direct service extends the performance and QoS benefits of Citrix SD-WAN to any SaaS application. It provides a branch location with resilient and high-performance access to private and redundant point-of-presences (PoPs) that are directly peered to thousands of SaaS applications, and over 150 cloud and internet exchanges. Every SD-WAN will inherently be dual-homed via virtual links to redundant PoPs to ensure maximum SaaS uptime and ability to failover in milliseconds. Additionally, Citrix has also integrated Cloud Direct service into its SD-WAN Orchestrator management platform to provide automation, visibility, and health-monitoring of every connection.

Citrix SD-WAN can classify over 4,500 applications and sub-applications with its deep packet inspection (DPI) engine out of the box. The integrated stateful firewall allows admins to create policies between zones and services. Citrix SD-WAN understands common applications and applies QoS policies to them, while providing fine tuning for further routing customization. Citrix SD-WAN is one of the only solutions that can identify and classify Office 365 traffic and route it directly to the nearest Office 365 front door on the first packet to reduce latency. 

 Optimize Office 365 performance with Citrix SD-WAN (1:37)

Most applications require high performance, reliability, and quality in order to deliver the expected user experience.

Citrix SD-WAN can:

• With the ICA traffic streams, Citrix SD-WAN can automatically prioritize and steer traffic streams, even over a single port. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops traffic is configured so the various virtual subchannels are split across multiple streams (in-band audio, display remoting, multimedia redirection, printing) and then prioritized for an optimized experience, especially when it comes to real-time communications.
• Match each packet in real time to the most optimal path and load balance the packets across multiple links simultaneously without the need for time-consuming reordering of packets at the destination.  
• Allow traffic from a single session to be duplicated over two or more links in the same virtual path to ensure real-time traffic always arrives and large tasks such as backups and large file transfers are completed quickly.
• Efficiently utilize asymmetric networks and measure the path in both directions based on path metrics, QoS policy, firewall policy, and priority and then place the next packet on the best eligible path.

The failover of a network link can interrupt user productivity and customer communications. Manually rerouting traffic to back-up links forces high-priority applications to contend with all other traffic for limited bandwidth, creating user dissatisfaction.

Citrix SD-WAN:

• Is application aware, ensuring reliable packet delivery and application performance by routing traffic along the most optimal links between two points on a per-packet basis.
• Detects network link outages and any degradation in link conditions or congestion to automatically reroute traffic to alternate available links.
• Can identify outages and take corrective actions in less than a second, making outages unnoticeable to users.

Citrix SD-WAN offers a range of deployment options including pre-configured appliances and virtual appliances that run in the cloud. Citrix SD-WAN orchestration automates provisioning of cloud on-ramps for SaaS, IaaS, data center, and security resources.

• Citrix offers branch connectivity to IaaS clouds through the virtual SD-WAN appliance (VPX) available on the Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud Platform marketplaces. Citrix SD-WAN improves the performance of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops in these clouds by prioritizing high-priority ICA channels over less critical ones during periods of bandwidth contention to ensure that application performance doesn’t suffer when only limited resources are available.
• Citrix SD-WAN uses Microsoft Azure Virtual WAN APIs to automate network deployments, removing the complexity of connecting branch offices to local Azure PoPs. Traffic is sped up across Microsoft’s private Azure backbone network with intelligent routing for improved access to cloud resources across the world. Additionally, connecting a physical SD-WAN appliance in the branch to a virtual SD-WAN appliance in Azure in your VNET provides benefits including bandwidth aggregation, QoS, packet duplication, and support of the Citrix ICA protocol.

Whether your applications reside in SaaS, hybrid-, or multi-cloud environments, Citrix provides integrated and centralized control.

• Starting from the branch, Citrix SD-WAN includes a built-in stateful firewall.
  
• Optionally, add next-generation firewall capabilities through virtual network functions from partners.
• In IaaS clouds such as AWS, Azure, or GCP, Citrix offers virtual firewalls.
• Citrix SD-WAN automates IPsec tunnel creation to connect branches to Azure Virtual WAN.
• For the breakout of internet traffic, Citrix partners with vendors who provide cloud-based security. Citrix SD-WAN uses APIs to synchronize with the management systems of partners such as  Zscaler and Palo Alto , so setting up cloud security from Citrix SD-WAN is simply a few clicks away.