350-401 Network Assurance Practice Question
Which TWO statements are true about IP SLA? (Choose two.)
⚠ Common exam trap
Cisco often tests the misconception that IP SLA uses real user traffic (Option D) or that it is limited to RTT (Option E), when in fact it generates synthetic probes and can measure one-way delay with proper time synchronization.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
IP SLA can be used with tracking objects to trigger route changes.
IP SLA can be combined with tracking objects and the 'track' command to influence routing decisions. When an IP SLA probe fails or falls below a threshold, the tracked object changes state, which can trigger a route change (e.g., via a static route with a higher administrative distance or a PBR policy). This allows the network to react to network performance or reachability issues automatically.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
IP SLA is only supported on ASR routers.
Why it's wrong here
IP SLA is a software feature within Cisco IOS, IOS-XE, and IOS-XR platforms, not a hardware-specific capability of ASR routers. It is supported on a wide range of Cisco routers and switches, including ISRs, Catalyst, and even Nexus platforms, provided the release and feature license permit it. The assumption that only ASR routers support IP SLA likely comes from ASR being common at the enterprise edge, but that is a platform popularity bias, not a technical restriction.
- ✓
IP SLA can be used with tracking objects to trigger route changes.
Why this is correct
IP SLA operations can be tied to Cisco tracking objects using the 'track' command, where the tracked object state changes based on probe reachability or response-time thresholds. When the probe fails consecutive times, the tracking object transitions to 'down', which can trigger a floating static route, policy-based routing, or other route manipulation to redirect traffic. This creates a dynamic failover or convergence mechanism driven by synthetic traffic rather than solely by physical link state.
- ✓
IP SLA can measure jitter between two devices.
Why this is correct
IP SLA supports a UDP jitter operation that sends a series of synthetic UDP packets at a predetermined rate and interval between a source and destination running the IP SLA Responder. By embedding sequence numbers and timestamps in the packets, the operation calculates jitter (inter-packet delay variance), one-way delay, and packet loss. This provides a quantitative measure of network QoE, which is especially useful for VoIP and video traffic, and it does not rely on actual user data.
- ✗
IP SLA uses actual user traffic for measurements.
Why it's wrong here
IP SLA generates its own synthetic or probe traffic with controlled parameters such as packet size, protocol, and frequency, rather than monitoring or using live user traffic. This approach ensures consistent, repeatable measurements that can be compared over time and across different paths without contaminating user data. Real user traffic analysis is a function of technologies like NetFlow or NBAR, not IP SLA.
- ✗
IP SLA can only measure round-trip time, not one-way delay.
Why it's wrong here
IP SLA can measure one-way delay, but only when the source and destination devices have synchronized clocks, typically via NTP or PTP. The base ICMP echo operation only reports round-trip time, but advanced operations like UDP jitter and UDP delay can return one-way values. Thus, claiming IP SLA can only measure RTT is overly restrictive and ignores its more sophisticated capabilities that require proper time synchronization.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Route Redistribution and Filtering
Key term
Policy Based Routing
Policy Based Routing (PBR) is a technology that allows network traffic to be forwarded based on user-defined policies rather than just the destination IP address in the routing table.
Key term
IP SLA
IP SLA (Service-Level Agreement) is a Cisco feature that actively monitors network performance by generating and measuring synthetic traffic between devices.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This 350-401 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Cisco certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the 350-401 exam.