Cisco Certified Network Professional Practice Test 2025 – Your All-in-One Guide to Exam Success!

Fragmentation can have a significant impact on network performance, particularly in terms of latency and overhead. When a large packet is fragmented into smaller packets to accommodate the maximum transmission unit (MTU) of the network, several things happen that can lead to performance degradation.

First, fragmentation increases overhead because each fragmented packet contains additional headers. This means that more bandwidth is consumed for control information rather than for the actual data. As a result, the effective data transmission is reduced, leading to lower throughput.

Second, the process of reassembling fragmented packets at the destination introduces latency. Each fragment must arrive and be processed before the complete packet can be reconstructed. If fragments are lost or experience varied network delays, it can further delay the entire transmission as the destination waits for all pieces to arrive.

In summary, while fragmentation is necessary for handling packets that exceed the MTU limit, it can lead to increased overhead and latency, which can negatively affect network performance. Thus, understanding the implications of fragmentation is crucial for network design and troubleshooting.