What is a met­ro­pol­i­tan area network (MAN)?

A met­ro­pol­i­tan area network (MAN) is a network that enables com­mu­ni­ca­tion across a large area. It is bigger than a local area network (LAN) and smaller than a wide area network (WAN).

What is a met­ro­pol­i­tan area network (MAN) and what is it used for?

A met­ro­pol­i­tan area network (MAN) is a network that connects multiplecomputers located in a par­tic­u­lar ge­o­graph­i­cal area. The area that the network can cover is larger than a local area network (LAN) and smaller than that of a wide area network (WAN).

By using various, in­di­vid­ual resources to create a com­pre­hen­sive network, a met­ro­pol­i­tan area network is able to serve the requests of multiple devices that would otherwise have to rely on numerous local area networks. This type of network can serve a few buildings, different branches of a company (provided they are rel­a­tive­ly close to each other), a town or single city, or even several neigh­bor­ing cities.

Despite its name, a met­ro­pol­i­tan area network doesn’t have to be located within a city or connected to one. The name simply refers to the potential scope of the network. MANs can reach up to 100 kilo­me­ters, making them suitable for rural areas as well.

In­ter­na­tion­al telecom companies have relied on the foun­da­tion­al prin­ci­ples behind met­ro­pol­i­tan area networks since the 1990s, using them as an al­ter­na­tive to con­ven­tion­al telephone networks. MANs can be combined at both a national level within a wide area network (WAN) or even in­ter­na­tion­al­ly in a global area network (GAN).

How do met­ro­pol­i­tan area networks work?

Met­ro­pol­i­tan area networks are generally an ag­gre­ga­tion of different local area networks, connected to each other using backbone fiber optic cables. Typically, unlit fiber lines (commonly referred to as dark fiber lines) are used to connect the different networks. These are pre­vi­ous­ly unused fiber optic cables that are capable of trans­mit­ting data, enabling high data through­put rates.

In addition to telecom companies, more and more municipal providers are setting up MAN tech­nol­o­gy and renting out the networks to private internet providers at a cost. Uni­ver­si­ties also use the tech­nol­o­gy to connect campus buildings that are spread across a city.

MAN tech­nol­o­gy ensures better net­work­ing and is con­sid­ered to be sig­nif­i­cant­ly more durable than al­ter­na­tive options. It also offers high trans­mis­sion speeds for data traffic. Using a met­ro­pol­i­tan area network is generally more cost-efficient than using numerous different local area networks, par­tic­u­lar­ly for high data volumes.