Optimize Low Traffic Ports Based on Historical Traffic Patterns

This topic describes how to reduce device-level energy consumption by disabling ports that consistently carry low or negligible traffic during specific time windows, based on historical usage patterns.

Network traffic often exhibits predictable patterns over time. Some ports consistently carry low or negligible traffic during specific off-peak windows. These idle ports continue to stay powered on and consume baseline power.

The Low Traffic Port Optimization recommendation list such ports by analyzing several days of historical per-port traffic telemetry. When the system detects a stable pattern of repeated low utilization during defined time windows for a port, it marks the port as a safe candidate for temporary shutdown during those windows.

Disabling such ports helps reduce the device’s baseline energy consumption without affecting workload performance.

By aligning each port’s operational state with its actual traffic demand, this recommendation helps make the device’s power usage more proportional to the network’s utilization patterns, improve energy efficiency, and lower operational cost.

A port is included in the Low Traffic Port Optimization recommendation when:

It consistently operates below the configured low-traffic utilization threshold during the same hours across multiple consecutive days.
Note:
You can configure the port utilization thresholds used for this analysis at the organization and site levels. See, Configure Port Threshold for the Organization and Configure Port Threshold for a Site.

If no thresholds are configured, the system applies the default thresholds for all ports.

By default, the threshold for low traffic is set at 10%.
Disabling the port during the low-traffic window is operationally safe.
Sufficient historical telemetry exists to establish a predictable pattern.

The Low Traffic Port Optimization recommendation provides actionable guidance, such as the list of eligible ports, the observed low-traffic windows, and the relevant configlet-based actions required to safely disable ports and reduce idle power consumption. It also highlights the potential energy savings achievable by applying the recommendation.

Note:

The recommendation service runs once per day at around 3 AM UTC. Each run uses historical per-port traffic telemetry and the configuration data available at the time. The Recommendation tab displays the most recently generated results for the device.

Changes to port states, traffic patterns, or threshold configurations that occur outside the current run window are reflected in recommendations after the next run.

Use the Per-Port Peak / Off-Peak Traffic Patterns heatmap available on the Device-Level Sustainability dashboard to view traffic patterns for all ports.

Note:

The Recommendation tab appears empty, if no safe or meaningful recommendations or power saving actions were identified based on the latest device telemetry.

To view underutilized ports and review the recommended actions:

From the main menu, click Sustainability.
The Organization-level Sustainability Dashboard appears.
Navigate to the Top Sites by Energy Consumption widget and click on a site with high energy consumption.

The Site-Level Sustainability Dashboard appears.
On the Site-Level Sustainability Dashboard, navigate to the Top Device by Energy Consumption widget and click on a device to investigate further.

The Device-Level Sustainability Dashboard appears.
On the Device-Level Sustainability Dashboard, review the Per-Port Peak / Off-Peak Traffic Patterns heatmap on the Overview tab to understand the device's port activity trends.

Navigate to the Recommendation tab. The Low Traffic Port Optimization recommendation card appears on the top of the page.

The card highlights the recommendation type, the count of ports identified as candidates for temporary shutdown, and the potential energy savings you can achieve by applying this recommendation.

Note:

Recommendations are generated only if low traffic ports are identified on a device.
Atleast 3 days of data is required to generate low traffic port optimization recommendation.

Click the recommendation card to open the detailed recommendation panel.

The recommendation includes the following fields:

Table 1: Field Description
Field	Description
Recommendation Type	A high-level description of the recommendation type. Indicates the type of recommendation, the number of ports identified for applying the suggestion, and the potential energy savings achievable if the recommendation is applied.
Device Port	Ports identified as carrying low or negligible traffic. Ports are classified into the following types: Note: Port type is applicable only to connected ports. Server—Ports that connect network devices to end hosts. Fabric—Ports that interconnect switches within the data center fabric. Unknown—Ports that do not belong to any Apstra-managed topology or ports for which topology or device‑role information is not available. Use the drop-down to select a port and view its specific recommendation.
Summary	A brief explanation of the observed traffic patterns during specific time windows and the recommended optimization action.
Actions	Provides step-by-step guidance and relevant configlet-based actions required to disable the port without impacting the network traffic. Note: You must use the configlets in Apstra Data Center Director to apply configuration changes to the device. For more information on configlets, see Configlets in the Apstra Data Center Director User Guide.
Benefits	Displays quantified advantages, such as estimated power and cost savings and reduced GHG emissions.
Risks	Highlight caveats such as potential dependencies, safety checks, and guardrails to consider before applying the suggested changes.
Timestamp	Shows when the recommendation was generated and how long it is valid. Note: Recommendations are refreshed daily based on the latest device telemetry.

Apply the suggested recommendation.
Use the configlets in Apstra Data Center Director to apply configuration changes to the device.

Configlets are custom configuration snippets that you can apply on a device through Apstra Data Center Director.
Note:
- Configuration changes made using configlets override Apstra-intended configuration.
- You may not get warnings for incorrect configurations pushed using configlets. Ensure you test and validate configlets in a dedicated validation environment before deploying them to the production environment.
- Passwords and other secret keys are not encrypted in configlets.
After applying the configurations, return to the Sustainability dashboard to validate the results.
Regularly verify device's port activity, power savings, energy consumption, and so on.
Note:
- Changes to port states, traffic patterns, or threshold configurations may take up to 24 hours to be reflected in the Sustainability dashboards.
- Updating port thresholds affects future recommendations and may also change the applicability window of recommendations after the next execution cycle.

Optimize Low Traffic Ports Based on Historical Traffic Patterns

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