Which routing approach is simple to understand and configure but may not scale well?

• A. Link State
• B. Hybrid
• C. Static
• D. Distance Vector

Answer: (D)

Distance Vector routing is the simplest to understand and configure because each router only needs to know how far a destination is (in hops) and which neighbor to forward to. Routers share their distance vectors with directly connected neighbors, so you don’t need a full map of the network or complex calculations. This works well in small networks where the topology doesn’t change often and the routing needs are modest.

But as networks grow, this simplicity becomes a drawback. Updates happen periodically to all neighbors, which can waste bandwidth and slow down how quickly the network adapts to changes. Convergence can be slow, and as the number of routers increases, the potential for routing loops or the “count-to-infinity” problem grows unless extra mechanisms are added. That’s why distance-vector approaches don’t scale as efficiently to large or highly dynamic networks, even though they’re easy to set up.