Conflicting Information on BGP Support in Catalyst 9300L with Network

[francispoisson2]

Hello,
We are an educational institution in the process of selecting Cisco Catalyst switches for both infrastructure deployment and teaching purposes in advanced networking courses. In our evaluation of the Catalyst 9300L (e.g., C9300L-24T-4X-A), we have encountered conflicting information from sellers regarding its support for BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) and other dynamic9300, 9300L, Cisco Catalyst Center protocol.
Specifically, we would like to confirm:
Does the Catalyst 9300L, when licensed with Network Advantage, fully support BGP (IPv4 and IPv6 address families, full peer capabilities) and other dynamic routing protocols in the same way as the standard Catalyst 9300?
Some sources indicate that the 9300L is functionally equivalent to the 9300 in terms of routing protocol support with the same license, while others claim that the 9300L has limitations, even with Network Advantage.
This information is essential for us to make an informed decision that aligns with our students’ learning experience.
Thank you very much for your guidance.

[M02@rt37 · Accepted solution]

Hello @francispoisson2,

As concerned platform c9300L-24T-4X-A, the "-A" indicates it ships with Network Advantage, so BGP is supported on this model just like the regular 9300.

Functionally, from a software and feature set point of view, both suport BGP and dynamic routing equaly with the same licence.

[Joseph W. Doherty]

As best I can tell, in theory, with an advanced license, both the 9300L and 9300, should have feature parity.

In practice, the 9300L's hardware is less capable than the 9300's.  So, you might run into performance issues sooner with a 9300L, like number of BGP routes being supported.

[francispoisson2]

Would that be a limitation for education purposes in a test environment?

[Joseph W. Doherty]

Would that be a limitation for education purposes in a test environment?

I believe very, very (very) unlikely.