Data centers need very high levels of network bandwidth and reliability. NGFW clustering is a way to provide redundancy to two PA-7500 Series firewalls in an NGFW cluster in the event of a link failure, card failure, or chassis failure. NGFW clustering blends the legacy HA active/active and active/passive solutions into a single high availability solution. The two cluster nodes connect over a single HSCI connection. The firewalls maintain a dual active data plane with a single active control plane. Neighboring devices see the NGFW cluster as a single Layer 2 (virtual wire) or Layer 3 device.

The NGFW cluster solution reduces failover time, increases resiliency, and supports a multichassis link aggregation group (MC-LAG). The firewalls in the NGFW cluster increase port availability, require fewer IP addresses, and rely on open standards.