Cisco Wireless AP Modes

Hello Joshua

I understand your confusion, and I believe this has to do with the use of the term “modes”. Unfortunately, it is used to describe multiple things.

First of all, an AP can either run as an autonomous AP or as a lightweight AP (notice I didn’t use the word mode?). The first means all the intelligence of its functionality is contained within the device itself, the second means that the intelligence runs in the wireless controller on the network or in the cloud. Whether you use lightweight or autonomous has to do with the deployment model you are using, and you can find out more about that here:

Now, each of these deployment methods have their own modes. An autonomous AP can also be considered an AP in a non-infrastructure deployment. In other words, it doesn’t function as part of the network infrastructure, all of its network functionality is contained within the device itself.
Those APs that run in autonomously can be configured to function in one of the “non-infrastructure modes” as listed in the book, as well as in this lesson:

(Now the book includes Mesh as a non-infrastructure mode, however, Rene describes it as another type of deployment model, which makes more sense to me.)

Finally, for those access points running in a lightweight deployment, they too can be configured to function in any one of the AP modes, as listed in this lesson:

So to sum up, there are two deployment models, autonomous and lightweight. Each has its own list of modes:

Autonomous (non-infrastructure):

  • Repeater
  • Workgroup Bridge
  • Outdoor Bridge

Lightweight

  • Local
  • Monitor
  • FlexConnect
  • Sniffer
  • Rogue Detector
  • Bridge/Mesh
  • Flex plus Bridge
  • SE-Connect

Mesh is a special case that the book considers non-infrastructure, while others (including Rene) consider it simply a third deployment model.

I hope this has been helpful!

Laz

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