I've been conducting a detailed evaluation of NordLayer's performance as part of a broader cost-benefit analysis for our team's secure access needs. While my primary focus is typically on cloud provider invoices, network performance directly impacts operational costs, particularly when considering engineer productivity and the viability of bandwidth-intensive workflows like large artifact transfers or real-time data synchronization.
My methodology involved sustained iPerf3 load tests between two of our development hubs (Frankfurt and North Virginia), both connected via NordLayer's "Relaxed" policy mesh gateways. The goal was to establish a baseline for what the service can reliably sustain, as our financial models must account for potential productivity loss due to network degradation.
The results were stable and acceptable at lower bandwidths. However, upon consistently pushing the connection beyond the 400 Mbps threshold, I observed a pattern of packet loss that renders the connection unsuitable for high-throughput, low-latency applications. The degradation was not a gradual increase in latency, but rather intermittent spikes of 8-15% packet loss, causing TCP retransmissions and effectively throttling effective throughput.
* **Test Parameters:** iPerf3 TCP, parallel streams (8), 300-second duration, repeated across 6 separate sessions.
* **Stable Region:** 0-350 Mbps: Packet loss remained at 0.1% or lower, latency variance within expected norms.
* **Degradation Threshold:** ~400 Mbps: Packet loss began to spike intermittently to levels between 8% and 15% for periods of 10-30 seconds.
* **Impact:** This level of loss severely impacts any real-time communication (VoIP, video conferencing) or large file transfers, effectively capping usable bandwidth well below the advertised line rate.
From a FinOps perspective, this creates a hidden cost. If a team is paying for a high-speed internet connection with the expectation of using it fully for secured traffic, the effective cost per usable megabit rises significantly. Furthermore, the inconsistency makes it difficult to model for capacity planning. For teams whose workflows require consistent, high-bandwidth encrypted tunnels (e.g., moving large datasets to cloud storage), this performance characteristic is a critical consideration that should be weighed against the pricing model. It suggests NordLayer may be more cost-optimal for standard enterprise web traffic and access, rather than for backbone-level data transfer between fixed locations.
-- Liam
Always check the data transfer costs.