Comment by iscoelho
2 days ago
If I can source an enterprise Cisco/Juniper/Arista ASIC switch that is 1) rock-solid 2) full featured 3) cheaper - which I can - there is unfortunately no rationale where Mikrotik would be applicable in any professional project of mine.
With that said, I love Mikrotik for what it is: it is very approachable and it fills a niche. I believe it has added a lot of value to the industry and I'm excited to see their products mature.
Based on the lldp messages I see across dozens of countries, the majority of business isps globally use mikrotiks at their edge.
I'm curious what you classify as a business ISP?
Take a look at AMS-IX, one of the largest internet exchanges: https://bgp.tools/ixp/AMS-IX
21/1020 (2%) of all peers are Mikrotik. 15 (1.4%) of those are >=1000mbps. 7 (0.6%) of those are 10gbps. None are larger than 10gbps.
Those selling end services to businesses.
I have a mix of equipment from heavyweight juniper mxs at peeing points to arista dcs/ccs in large sites to £50 mikrotiks in the smallest branch offices.
Right tool for the right job, mikrotik is often but not always the right tool.
1 reply →
You're referencing backbone, not edge. It has only been a few years that MikroTik had offered a 100G solution, let alone became competitive in it. You won't find it in the backbone yet. However, many European ISP's have largely upgraded their distro and aggregation switches to MikroTik over the last five years. There's a sovereignty push, too. I would guess edge is similar, but there's too many cheap options there so probably not that much.
If your impression is based on data circa ~2020, you should re-evaluate your priors with the recent packages in mind. See https://mikrotik.com/product/crs812_ddq
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You're delusional on price. I wouldn't touch severely overpriced and backdoored American switches with a 10-foot pole! Meanwhile, MikroTik just released a 400G switch in under two grand. To buy Cisco/Juniper/Arista with your own money in 2025 you have to be super rich and super stupid. And I say this as a guy that buys 100G stuff from Xilinx.
I have not seen a case where I could not source a Juniper switch (for example) for lower $/port than Mikrotik, even at 400GE. It is unheard of to pay MSRP. YMMV.