networking curriculum
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networking > network types > Metropolitan Area Network

Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)

Metropolitan Area Networks are not commonly mentioned - they are only mentioned for the sake of completeness. MANs connect computers in an area larger than a LAN, but smaller than a WAN — usually within a single city (hence the term "metropolitan"). A small business with offices distributed around Melbourne, for example, might consider a MAN to connect the LANs at each office.

MANs might be interconnected with fibre-optic cable, microwave transceivers (which are "line of sight" links) or high-speed data lines (such as ISDN), or with Virtual Private Networking across the Internet.