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Local breakout lets a branch office send internet-bound traffic straight to the internet from its local site, instead of routing it back through a central data centre first. Colt builds local breakout into every SD WAN and network as a service (NaaS) deployment we run, because it's reshaping how enterprises design their wide area networks.
Why local breakout matters
Traditional WANs backhaul all traffic, including internet-bound traffic, through a central hub or data centre before it reaches its destination. That approach made sense when most of your applications lived in a private data centre. It makes far less sense now that so many live in the cloud.
Backhauling a request to Microsoft 365 or Salesforce through head office, only for it to bounce straight back out to the internet, adds distance, adds hops and adds delay. Local breakout removes that detour. Traffic destined for the internet or a public cloud service exits your network at the branch, not hundreds of miles away.
How local breakout works
An SD WAN edge device at the branch inspects each packet and decides, in real-time, where it needs to go. Traffic for trusted, low-risk destinations, such as approved software as a service applications, breaks out locally to the internet. Traffic that needs to reach your private network, such as an internal application or a data centre resource, still routes over the WAN as before.
This selective approach is what separates local breakout from simply opening every branch to the open internet. Policies decide what breaks out and what doesn't, so you keep control over sensitive traffic while letting everyday cloud traffic take the shortest path.
Local breakout in SD WAN and NaaS architectures
Local breakout shows what software-defined networking makes possible. In an SD WAN deployment, breakout policies are centrally defined and pushed out to every site, so your network team can change how traffic is handled across hundreds of branches without touching a single router by hand.
In a network as a service model, this flexibility extends further. You can adjust bandwidth, breakout policies and security controls on-demand as your business opens new sites, onboards new cloud applications or scales up in a region, without waiting on new hardware or long lead times.
Benefits of local breakout
- Lower latency: your traffic takes the shortest possible path, which matters for real-time applications like voice and video
- Reduced backhaul cost: less traffic crossing the core WAN means you can right-size expensive private circuits instead of over-provisioning them
- Better application performance: cloud and software as a service applications respond faster when traffic reaches them directly
- Improved resilience: a single central chokepoint no longer carries every byte of your internet traffic
- Simpler scaling: new sites get direct, secure internet access from day one, without waiting for backhaul capacity to catch up
Is local breakout secure?
It's a fair question. Sending traffic straight to the internet from a branch means you lose the inspection a central data centre used to provide. Modern SD WAN and secure access service edge designs solve this by pushing security controls, such as firewalling, web filtering and threat inspection, out to the branch or into the cloud, so your traffic gets the same protection without the same detour. Colt pairs local breakout with policy-based controls, so you decide exactly which traffic is trusted to break out and which still needs deeper inspection.
Frequently asked questions
What is local breakout?
Local breakout is a network design where internet-bound traffic from a branch site exits directly to the internet at that site, rather than being routed back through a central data centre or head office first.
How is local breakout different from backhauling?
Backhauling sends all traffic, including internet-bound traffic, through a central hub before it reaches its destination. Local breakout skips that detour for approved traffic, sending it straight to the internet from the branch.
How does local breakout work in SD WAN?
An SD WAN edge device at each site applies policies that decide, per application, whether traffic breaks out locally to the internet or routes over the private WAN. This happens automatically and in real-time.
Is local breakout secure?
Yes, when it's deployed with the right controls. Security functions such as firewalling and threat inspection move to the branch or the cloud, so your traffic gets the same level of protection without needing to travel back through a central site first.
What are the main benefits of local breakout?
Lower latency, reduced backhaul costs, better performance for cloud and software as a service applications, and simpler scaling as your business adds new sites.
