Flexible UPF Deployment in 5G Core Network: Central, Regional, and Edge
In the 5G Core Network (5GC), the User Plane Function (UPF) plays a pivotal role in data routing, policy enforcement, and traffic offloading. To meet diverse service requirements—ranging from consumer broadband to mission-critical industrial applications—IPLOOK enables on-demand UPF deployment across three strategic layers: central, regional, and edge.
By leveraging an IP Carrier Network, a Full Mesh topology can be established between home SMFs and distributed UPFs, ensuring optimal routing and redundancy. For high availability, IPLOOK recommends implementing a UPF Pool—where multiple UPFs are deployed across geographically dispersed data centers. In the event of a site failure, traffic is automatically rerouted to healthy UPFs, guaranteeing uninterrupted service continuity.
1. Central Deployment
- Use Case: Consumer (2C) services
- Purpose: Provide general Internet access at scale
- Advantage: Cost-efficient for large-scale, latency-tolerant traffic
2. Regional Deployment
- For 2C: Supports high-bandwidth applications (e.g., video streaming, cloud gaming) by deploying UPF closer to users—reducing Round-Trip Time (RTT) and enhancing quality of experience.
- For 2B: Enables enterprises to access the Internet while minimizing backhaul traffic to the core network.
- Shared UPF Model: Multiple local businesses share a regional UPF to achieve local traffic offload, lowering costs and improving performance.
3. Edge Deployment
- Ideal for 2B: Mission-critical applications requiring ultra-low latency (<10ms) or strict data sovereignty—such as industrial automation, AR/VR live streaming, remote surgery, and smart factories.
- Compact UPF Integration: IPLOOK’s compact UPF can be co-located with third-party applications at the edge for seamless local processing and offload.
- LBO (Local Breakout): UPF deployed at the network edge provides direct local Internet breakout, bypassing the central core and significantly reducing latency and bandwidth consumption.
Why Choose IPLOOK for UPF Deployment?
As a global provider of cloud-native mobile core solutions, IPLOOK Technologies offers a fully virtualized, highly scalable 5GC UPF that supports flexible deployment across central, regional, and edge locations. Our solution delivers:
- Multi-Gbps throughput (up to 100 Gbps per instance)
- Seamless integration with third-party ecosystems
- Disaster-resilient UPF pooling
- Support for MEC, private networks, and network slicing
Whether you’re an operator scaling consumer services or an enterprise building a private 5G network, IPLOOK provides the agility and performance you need—today and for 5G-Advanced tomorrow.
Interested in learning more?
Contact us to discuss your 5GC and UPF deployment strategy!
