What does the Active Flag on a route mean?

• A. Route is available
• B. Route is blocked
• C. Route is temporary
• D. Route is static

Answer: (A)

The Active flag shows that this route is currently being used to forward traffic. When a route is active, it is installed in the forwarding plane and selected as the best path for reaching its destination, so packets will be sent via the route’s next hop. If a route is not active, it exists in the table but isn’t used—perhaps because another route offers a better path or the next hop is unreachable. The Active flag doesn’t indicate whether a route was configured statically or learned dynamically; a static route can be active if it’s the chosen path, and dynamic routes can be active or not depending on the current network state. So the best description is that the Active flag means the route is the one currently used to forward packets.