Cisco ENCOR Cheat Sheet 2026

The 30 highest-yield Cisco ENCOR facts, distilled from real exam questions. Print it, save it as a PDF, or study it here — free, no sign-up.

1. What control plane protocol is utilized to map and resolve endpoints in a Cisco SD-Access fabric? → LISP
2. In an MPLS network, what does the term 'LSP' stand for? → Label Switched Path
3. Which command enables TACACS+ as the authentication method for console login on a Cisco IOS device? → aaa authentication login default tacacs+
4. What is the purpose of SNMP traps? → Send asynchronous event notifications from agent to manager
5. After making changes to settings on a switch in CONFIGURATION mode, only the most recent modifications will be implemented. → After you type copy running startup and reboot the switch
6. In EIGRP, what occurs when a router loses its Successor and no Feasible Successor exists in the topology table? → It enters Active state and sends QUERY messages to all neighbors
7. In a Cisco SD-WAN fabric, which component is responsible for distributing OMP routes and policies between vEdge/WAN Edge routers? → vSmart
8. What is a key advantage of using VXLAN over traditional VLANs in large data centers? → Support for up to 16 million segments vs 4,096 VLANs
9. In IPv6, which address type is equivalent to an IPv4 private (RFC 1918) address and is routable only within an organization? → Unique Local (FC00::/7)
10. Which header field uniquely identifies a VXLAN segment and is carried in the VXLAN header? → VNI (VXLAN Network Identifier)
11. Which spanning tree port state forwards traffic AND learns MAC addresses? → Forwarding
12. Which Cisco SD-WAN component acts as the orchestrator and facilitates initial authentication of WAN Edge routers? → vBond
13. What is produced once labels are exchanged over LDP between two routers? → LFIB
14. Removes one character0 → Ctrl-D
15. In the Cisco SD-Access architecture, what technology is used to offer Layer 2 and Layer 3 logical networks? → overlay network
16. What is the function of IP SLA in Cisco IOS? → Proactively measure network performance metrics like latency, jitter, and packet loss
17. What control plane protocol is employed between vSmart controllers and Cisco SD-WAN routers? → OMP
18. What is the function of a Cisco DNA Center intent-based networking API? → Express the desired network state and let the platform determine how to implement it
19. What is the primary function of MACsec (IEEE 802.1AE)? → Encrypt and integrity-protect traffic at Layer 2 on a hop-by-hop basis
20. Which OSPF network type is used by default on a point-to-point serial link? → Point-to-point
21. Which QoS model provides per-flow resource reservation using RSVP signaling? → IntServ
22. What type of ACL can filter traffic based on both source and destination IP, and also TCP/UDP port numbers? → Extended ACL
23. Which feature builds upon DHCP Snooping to prevent hosts from sending traffic with a spoofed source IP? → IP Source Guard
24. Which Spanning Tree Protocol feature allows a port to immediately transition to forwarding state when connected to an end device? → PortFast
25. What job does a fabric edge node have in an SD-Access setup? → Connects endpoints to the fabric and forwards their traffic.
26. Which Cisco wireless security standard uses SAE (Simultaneous Authentication of Equals) to replace PSK handshakes? → WPA3-Personal
27. Which Cisco IOS feature can detect and block rogue DHCP servers on a LAN segment? → DHCP Snooping
28. What number of bits make up an MPLS label? → 20
29. A network engineer needs to prevent a specific BGP prefix from being advertised to an eBGP peer. Which mechanism is most appropriate? → Outbound route filter with a prefix-list
30. Which component in an NFV architecture is responsible for lifecycle management of VNFs? → VNFM