What routing protocol uses bandwidth and delay as its metrics?

• A. Cost
• B. Hop Count and Reliability
• C. Delay and Load
• D. Bandwidth and Delay

Answer: (D)

Routing decisions hinge on the metric a protocol uses to evaluate a path. Bandwidth reflects how much data can flow on a link, while delay reflects how long packets take to traverse it. When a protocol incorporates both measurements, it can favor routes that are not only capable (high bandwidth) but also fast (low delay). The option that specifies bandwidth and delay aligns with this approach, and protocols like EIGRP use a composite metric built from these factors (with optional adjustments for reliability and load). The other selections describe metrics that don’t jointly capture both capacity and latency, so they don’t fit the described behavior as well.