Autonomous and controller modes

Updated: July 7, 2026

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Two installation modes are available.The autonomous mode supports the functionality of Cisco IOS XE non Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN deployment and the controller mode supports the Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN solution.

Describes the two installation modes that are available on devices. Autonomous mode supports the functionality of Cisco IOS XE in a non-Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN deployment and Controller mode supports the Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN solution.

Table 1. Comparison of modes
Feature	Autonomous Mode	Controller Mode
Configuration method	Command Line Interface (CLI) NETCONF	YANG-based configuration Cisco SD-WAN Manager NETCONF
Onboarding modes	Plug and Play Config-Wizard WebUI Bootstrap (USB, bootflash, and so on) Auto-Install (Python Script, TCL Script) ZTP (Using DHCP Option 150 and Option 67)	Plug and Play Bootstrap (USB, bootflash, and so on)
Licensing	Cisco Smart Licensing	Cisco High Performance Security (HSEC) software licensing. No device licensing.
Image type	Universalk9	Universalk9
Dual-IOSd redundancy model	Supported	Not Supported
High availability	Supported	Not Supported
Global configuration mode	configure terminal	config-transaction

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