What is a Failover Internet Connection?
Internet Failover Connection – EvdodepotUSA
An internet failover connection is an internet backup that kicks in when your primary internet connection fails. A failover keeps your business online when your primary connection goes down for maintenance, or when extreme weather, a natural disaster, a traffic accident, vandalism, or sabotage takes your primary connection temporarily out of commission.
Business interruptions can be very costly, even if they’re only temporary. In fact, the average small to medium-sized enterprise loses between $8,580 and $74,000 in revenue every hour it’s offline during normal operating hours. An internet failover prevents these interruptions, which can help your business maximize revenue and serve customers or clients with consistency.
Failovers are Usually Wireless Internet Connections
Most businesses use a wired internet connection, like cable internet, as a primary internet connection. While cable internet is usually the fastest and most affordable option for your business, it isn’t always fail-proof. In fact, wired connections are more susceptible to hardware damage than wireless connections. It’s also easy for a thief or vandal to cut internet wires, shutting off your internet, during a break-in at your business.
Many businesses use a wireless connection, usually mobile data, as a backup internet option. Wireless connections are great backups because remote infrastructure is safe from local disasters. If a bad traffic accident takes down your town’s cable infrastructure, for example, it won’t affect the mobile data signal you get from nearby cell towers. Also, to combat thieves and vandals, many smart security systems include a mandatory wireless failover connection.
Mobile Data is the Fastest Wireless Failover Option
Mobile data networks like 5G and 4G LTE are the fastest wireless internet options, which makes them the best failovers for cable internet. Rootmetrics finds that 5G networks like T-Mobile’s 600MHz 5G can deliver mean download speeds of up to 250 Mbps. While Ookla SpeedTest finds that the mean download speed across all 4G LTE mobile data networks in competitive areas is now more than 30 Mbps and, in rural areas, download speeds often top 20 Mbps.
These download speeds are fast enough to support most business applications, including video conferencing on platforms like Zoom or Skype. With a 5G or 4G LTE failover connection, you won’t have to change the way you do business when your failover kicks in. These wireless connections support the same online applications you already use to run your business.
Will your failover be fast enough?
Find Out More About 5G and 4G LTE Internet Speeds
While satellite internet is also wireless, 5G or 4G LTE are better failover solutions because, with these networks, you’ll experience speeds closer to what you’re used to getting with cable internet. While a satellite network takes an average of about 600 ms to connect with a host, mobile data networks often do the same thing in less than 50 ms. Due to this difference in latency, mobile data can feel as much as ten times faster than satellite internet.
A Failover Auto-starts Up When Your Internet Goes Down
With a dual WAN internet router, a failover will automatically activate every time your primary connection goes offline. As soon as the router stops detecting a wired connection, it will immediately connect to mobile data. The transition between the two internet connections is seamless, so your business will never lose access to critical applications – even temporarily.
How do dual WAN internet routers work? Find out more about our Hardware.
A Failover Internet Connection Protects Your Business’s Revenue and Reputation
Nothing is less professional than failing to provide your customers or clients with the products or services they expect from your business. While a business interruption can devastate your revenue flow, it can cost your business more than money. An interruption due to an internet outage can also damage your business’s reputation as a reliable and competent provider.
When your business can’t connect to the internet, your customers or clients are likely to take their business elsewhere either temporarily or, if the incident causes them to lose trust in your business, permanently. Hold on to your valued customers by installing a failover connection that keeps your business up and running, even when your primary internet connection fails.
Please feel free to share your experience about how you are benefiting from failover connectivity with our audience or check the coverage map for failover internet connections in your area.