Data sheet

Cisco public

Cisco Nexus 9500 Series

Switches

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 1 of 14

Contents
Product overview 3
Deployment scenarios 4
Spine-leaf fabric architecture 5
Core, Aggregation, and gateway roles 5
End-of-row access layer switch 5
Switch components for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series 6
Switch chassis for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series 6
Supervisor modules for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series 9
System controller for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform 9
Fabric module for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform 10
Fan trays for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform 10
Cisco Nexus 9500 platform power supply 11
Warranty 13
Cisco environmental sustainability 13
Service and Support 13
Cisco Capital 13
For more information 14

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 2 of 14

Product overview
Application architectures and deployment modes are rapidly evolving. Modern applications are multinode,
highly modular, and deployed over a combination of bare-metal, virtual, and cloud data center environments. In
addition to that, individual departments within an organization have varying infrastructure and networking needs.
These factors require that data center networks be simple, programmable, extensible, scalable, and shareable
to meet the demands of applications.

The Cisco Nexus® 9000 Series Switches operate in one of two modes – Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure
(Cisco ACI™) or Cisco NX-OS. In Cisco ACI mode, these switches provide a turnkey, fully automated, policy-
based architecture to design and manage data center fabrics. In Cisco NX-OS mode, these switches provide
the capability to use foundational layer 2/3 technologies, as well as modern technologies such as VXLAN, with
a Border Gateway Protocol‒Ethernet VPN (BGP-EVPN) control plane, Segment routing, Multiprotocol Label
Switching (MPLS), and automation via NX-APIs.

The Cisco Nexus 9000 Series Switches include the Nexus 9500 Series modular switches and the Nexus
9200/9300 Series fixed switches.

Figure 1.
Cisco Nexus 9000 Series Switch Chassis

The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series modular switches support a comprehensive selection of line cards and fabric
modules that provide 1-, 10-, 25-, 40-, 50-, 100-, 200-, and 400-Gigabit Ethernet interfaces. Using these line
cards the Cisco Nexus 9500 Series switches can be configured with up to.

1. 256 400-Gigabit Ethernet ports (or)

2. 524 200-Gigabit Ethernet ports# (or)

3. 1024 100-Gigabit Ethernet ports (or)

4. 2048 50-Gigabit Ethernet ports (or)

5. 1024 40-Gigabit Ethernet ports (or)

6. 2304 25-Gigabit Ethernet ports (or)

7. 2304 1/10-Gigabit Ethernet ports

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 3 of 14

The supervisor, system controller, power supplies, and line cards are common across all three switches. Each
switch, however, has unique fabric modules, and fan trays that plug in vertically in the rear of the chassis.

Table 1. Features and benefits

Feature Benefit

High performance The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series switch delivers nonblocking performance at a latency of 5
microseconds or less at 400-, 100-, 50-, 40-, 25-, 10-, and 1-Gigabit Ethernet speeds. This
enables customers to build robust and scalable high-speed fabrics that can support several
thousands of high-speed access ports.

Telemetry The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series switches support extensive switch and flow telemetry
capabilities that provide extensive real-time visibility into switch and fabric states.

High-density 1-, 10-, 25-, Organizations can transition from low-speed (100-Megabit Ethernet and 1-Gigabit Ethernet)
40- and 50-Gigabit server access designs to high-speed (1-, 10-, 25-, 40-, and 50-Gigabit Ethernet) server
Ethernet access access designs with the same port density.
configuration

High-density 10-, 40-, The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches help organizations transition from 1- and 10-Gigabit
100- and 400-Gigabit Ethernet infrastructure to 10-, 40-, 100-, and 400-Gigabit Ethernet infrastructures to support
Ethernet aggregation and the increased bandwidth demands of scale-out, multinode application environments. The
spine configuration compatibility of 400-Gigabit Ethernet QSFP-DD modules, 100-Gigabit Ethernet QSFP28
modules, and 40-Gigabit Ethernet QSFP+ modules enables the migration and coexistence of
40-, 100- and 400-Gigabit Ethernet ports in the fabric.

High availability, The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches are designed with redundant supervisors, system
reliability, and scalability controllers, power supplies, and fan trays, which eliminate any single point of failure in the
chassis. These switches also support up to 6 fabric modules, which provide redundancy and
graceful degradation of switching capacity in the event of fabric module failures. All
transceivers are pluggable to support the highest possible Mean Time Between Failure
(MTBF) for the switch.

Designed for the future The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches are designed for future expansion with the capability
to support higher speed ports and more bandwidth.

Power efficiency The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches are the first switch chassis designed without a
midplane. The line cards and fabric modules connect directly. This revolutionary design
provides optimal front-to-back airflow and helps the switch operate with less power. In
addition, all Cisco Nexus 9500 Series switch power supplies are rated at or higher than
80PLUS Platinum for AC inputs and equivalent efficiency for DC inputs.
The typical power consumption per 10-Gigabit Ethernet port is less than 3.5 watts (W).
The typical power consumption per 40- and 100-Gigabit Ethernet port is less than 14W and
22W respectively.

Deployment scenarios
The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches support various deployment scenarios:

● Spine nodes in a spine-leaf fabric

● Core or aggregation node in an L2/L3 network
● Border gateway in a L2/L3 network

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 4 of 14

Spine-leaf fabric architecture
The high port-density and ability to support multispeed ports on the same chassis make the Cisco Nexus 9500
Series Switches the ideal choice as a spine in spine-leaf fabric architectures. The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series
Switches can function as a spine in either Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (Cisco ACI) or Cisco NX-OS
operating modes (Figure 2).

Figure 2.
Spine-Leaf Architecture using Cisco Nexus 9300 and 9500 Switches

Cisco ACI is the most comprehensive solution to enable data center automation and application agility. It
provides a secure, scalable, deterministic, and integrated policy-based architecture, which enables rapid
application deployment and workload mobility in data centers. The Cisco Nexus 9000 Series cloud-scale
switches are the foundation to deploy and run Cisco ACI. The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series cloud-scale switches
and select Cisco 9300 Series cloud-scale switches provide the ACI spine functionality in the Cisco ACI fabric.
The Cisco Nexus 9300 Series cloud-scale switches provide the ACI leaf functionality in the Cisco ACI fabric.

In Cisco NX-OS mode, the Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches support foundational routing and switching
technologies along with modern technologies such as VXLAN with BGP-EVPN control plane, segment routing,
MPLS, and open APIs. These technologies provide the flexibility to build spine-leaf data center fabrics or
classical three-tier data center networks. In this mode, the Cisco® Data Center Network Manager (DCNM) can
manage the Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches.

Core, Aggregation, and gateway roles

The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches support line cards that provide a choice of smart buffers, deep buffers,
large tables, and high-density, high-speed Ethernet interfaces. These hardware capabilities, along with
extensive routing and switching software capabilities, make the Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches an excellent
choice as a core, aggregation, or gateway switch.

End-of-row access layer switch

As the Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switches support high-density, multispeed Ethernet ports, these switches can
also be deployed as end-of-row switches providing access connections to blade or rack servers. The Cisco
Nexus 9500 Series Switches also provide the flexibility to incrementally transition from lower-speed server
connections to higher-speed server connections.

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 5 of 14

Switch components for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series
The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switch includes the components shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3.
Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switch Components

The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series switches support several line cards and fabric modules. The following data
sheets describe each family of line cards and fabric modules:

● Cisco Nexus 9500 Cloud Scale Line Cards and Fabric Modules. URL:
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/nexus-9000-series-switches/datasheet-
c78-736677.html.
● Cisco Nexus 9500 R-Series (Deep Buffer) Line Cards and Fabric Modules. URL:
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/nexus-9000-series-switches/datasheet-
c78-738321.html.
● Cisco Nexus 9500 Classic Line Cards and Fabric Modules. URL:
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/nexus-9000-series-switches/datasheet-
c78-741336.html.

Switch chassis for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series

The Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Switch has Three Chassis – a 4-Slot, 8-Slot, and 16-Slot Chassis.

N9K-C9504: 4-Slot Chassis ● Up to 4 line cards

● Up to 4 power supplies

● Up to 6 fabric modules of the same type

● Up to 2 system controllers
● Up to 2 supervisors of the same type
● Up to 3 fan trays

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 6 of 14

N9K-C9508: 8-Slot Chassis ● Up to 8 line cards
● Up to 8 power supplies
● Up to 6 fabric modules of the same type
● Up to 2 system controllers
● Up to 2 supervisors of the same type
● Up to 3 fan trays

N9K-C9516: 16-Slot Chassis ● Up to 16 line cards

● Up to 10 power supplies

● Up to 6 fabric modules of the same type

● Up to 2 system controllers
● Up to 2 supervisors of the same type

● Up to 3 fan trays

Table 2. Cisco Nexus 9500 series switch chassis specifications

Cisco Nexus 9504 Chassis Cisco Nexus 9508 Chassis Cisco Nexus 9516 Chassis

Number of line card slots 4 8 16

Dimensions (H x W x D) 12.25 x 17.50 x 33.15 in. 22.70 x 17.50 x 31.76 in. 36.70 x 17.50 x 31.76 in.
(31.1 x 44.50 x 84.20 cm) (57.78 x 44.50 x 80.67 cm) (93.41 x 44.50 x 80.67 cm)

Weight 84 lb (38.2 kg) 150 lb (68.2 kg) 192 lb (87.3 kg)

Rack Units 7 13 21

Mean Time Between 1,038,080 928,910 680,000

Failure (MTBF) Hours

Operating temperature 32 to 104°F (0 to 40°C)

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 7 of 14

 Cisco Nexus 9504 Chassis Cisco Nexus 9508 Chassis Cisco Nexus 9516 Chassis

Nonoperating -40 to 158°F (-40 to 70°C)

temperature

Humidity 5 to 95% (noncondensing)

Altitude 0 to 13,123 ft (0 to 4,000m)

Regulatory compliance Products should comply with CE Markings according to directives 2004/108/EC and
2006/95/EC

Safety UL 60950-1 Second Edition

CAN/CSA-C22.2 No. 60950-1 Second Edition
EN 60950-1 Second Edition
IEC 60950-1 Second Edition
AS/NZS 60950-1
GB4943

EMC: Emissions 47CFR Part 15 (CFR 47) Class A

AS/NZS CISPR22 Class A
CISPR22 Class A
EN55022 Class A
ICES003 Class A
VCCI Class A
EN61000-3-2
EN61000-3-3
KN22 Class A
CNS13438 Class A

EMC: Immunity EN55024

CISPR24
EN300386
KN 61000-4 series

RoHS The product is RoHS-6 compliant with exceptions for leaded-ball grid-array (BGA) balls and
lead press-fit connectors.

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 8 of 14

Supervisor modules for the Cisco Nexus 9500 series
A pair of redundant supervisor modules manages all switch operations using a state-synchronized, active-
standby model. The supervisor accepts an external clock and supports management through multiple ports –
two USB ports, a serial port, and a 10/100/1000-Mbps Ethernet port. All supervisors support Cisco ACI or NX-
OS deployments. Redundant supervisors should be of the same type within a chassis.

Table 3. Cisco Nexus 9500 series supervisor modules specifications

N9K-SUP-A N9K-SUP-A+ N9K-SUP-B N9K-SUP-B+

Processor 4 core, 4 thread 4 core, 8 thread 6 core, 12 thread 6 core, 12 thread

1.8GHz x86 1.8GHz x86 2.2GHz x86 1.9GHz X86

DRAM 16GB 16GB 24GB 32GB

SSD 64GB 64GB 256GB 256GB

Weight 4.84 lb (2.2 kg) 5.2 lb (2.37 kg) 6.00 lb (2.72 kg) 5.3 lb (2.39 kg)

Typical power 69 W 69 W 75 W 75 W

Maximum power 80 W 80 W 80 W 90 W

MTBF hours 312,070 414,240 292,110 421,040

Hot swappable Yes

Airflow Port-side intake

System controller for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform

A pair of redundant system controllers offloads chassis management functions from the supervisor modules.
The controllers are responsible for managing the power supplies and fan trays; they are also the central point
for the Gigabit Ethernet Out-of-Band Channel (EOBC) between the supervisors, fabric modules, and line cards.

Table 4. Cisco Nexus 9500 series system controller specifications

N9K-SC-A

Weight 1.91 lb (0.9 kg)

Typical power 14 W

Maximum power 25 W

MTBF hours 1,380,210

Hot swappable Yes

Airflow Port-side intake

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 9 of 14

Fabric module for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform
Each Cisco Nexus 9500 Series Chassis supports up to six fabric modules, which plug in vertically at the back of
the chassis behind the fan trays. The Cisco Nexus 9500 line card and fabric module data sheets provide
additional information about the various fabric modules.

Fan trays for the Cisco Nexus 9500 platform

The Cisco Nexus 9500 chassis supports two versions of hot-swappable fan trays that are compatible with
specific fabric modules. Each fan tray covers two fabric module slots and enables front-to-back air-flow for the
entire chassis. An appropriate fabric module blank card should be installed in all empty fabric module slots to
ensure proper air-flow and cooling of the chassis.

Table 5. Fan tray specifications

N9K-C9504-FAN N9K-C9504-FAN2 N9K-C9508-FAN N9K-C9508-FAN2 N9K-C9516-FAN

Fabric N9K-C9504-FM-E N9K-C9504-FM-G N9K-C9508-FM-E2 N9K-C9508-FM-G N9K-C9516-FM-E2

Module
N9K-C9504-FM-R N9K-C9508-FM-E N9K-C9516-FM-E
N9K-C9504-FM-S N9K-C9508-FM-R N9K-C9504-FM
N9K-C9504-FM N9K-C9508-FM-S
N9K-C9508-FM

Fabric N9K-C9504-FM-CV N9K-C9504-FAN- N9K-C9508-FM-CV N9K-C9508-FAN- N9K-C9516-FM-CV

Module Blank PWR PWR

Weight 5.76 lb (2.6 kg) 8.2 lb (3.7 kg) 9.59 lb (4.4 kg) 8.6 lb (3.9 kg) 11.50 lb (5.2 kg)

Typical 95 W 306W 176 W 450W 330 W

power

Maximum 150 W 600W 250 W 900W 451 W

power

Hot Yes
swappable

Airflow Port-side intake

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 10 of 14

Cisco Nexus 9500 platform power supply
The Cisco Nexus 9500 platform supports hot-swappable, front-panel-accessible AC, DC, and universal high
voltage AC/DC power supplies. The total power budget required for the mix and number of line cards and
fabric modules installed in the chassis determines the ability to support power supply redundancy modes –
combined, n + 1, n + n, or input-source redundancy.

The 3150W high voltage AC/DC power supply offers two power inputs each of which can provide up to 3150 W
of output power. This unique capability offers more flexibility in provisioning power redundancy for the chassis.

Table 6. Power supply specifications

Cisco Nexus 9500 Cisco Nexus 9500 Cisco Nexus 9500 Cisco Nexus 9500
3000W AC Power 3000W DC Power 3000W HV AC/DC 3150W HV AC/DC
Supply Supply Power Supply Power Supply

Output power 3000 W 3000 W 3000 W 3150 W

Input voltage AC: 200V to 240V DC: -48V to -60V AC: 200V to 277V AC: 200V to 277V
(nominal)
DC: 240V to 380V DC: 240V to 380V
-40V to -72V (nominal) (nominal)
(min – max)
192V to 400V 192V to 400V
(min – max) (min – max)

Number of inputs 1 2 (1500 W output 1 2 (3150 W output

per input) per input)

Frequency 50 to 60 Hz N/A AC: 47 to 63 Hz AC: 47 to 63 Hz

DC: N/A DC: N/A

Efficiency 80PLUS Platinum 80PLUS Platinum 80PLUS Platinum 80PLUS Titanium

Equivalent (AC) (AC)
80PLUS Platinum 80PLUS Titanium
Equivalent (DC) Equivalent (DC)

Weight 6.2 lb (2.8 kg) 6.4 lb (2.9 kg) 5.9 lb (2. 7 kg) 9.9 lb (4.5 kg)

MTBF hours 868,870 1,761,580 965,700 838,900

Hot swappable Yes

Airflow Yes

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 11 of 14

Table 7. Ordering information

Part number Product description

Hardware

N9K-C9504 (=) Cisco Nexus 9504 Chassis with 4 line card slots

N9K-C9508(=) Cisco Nexus 9508 Chassis with 8 line card slots

N9K-C9516(=) Cisco Nexus 9516 Chassis with 16 line card slots

N9K-SUP-A+(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 4-Core/8-Thread Supervisor

N9K-SUP-B+(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 6-Core/12-Thread Supervisor

N9K-SUP-A(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 4-Core/4-Thread Supervisor

N9K-SUP-B(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 6-Core/12-Thread Supervisor

N9K-SC-A(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 System Controller

N9K-PAC-3000W-B(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 3000W 200V to 240V AC PS, Port-Side Intake

N9K-PDC-3000W-B(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 3000W -48V-60V DC PS, Port-Side Intake

N9K-PUV-3000W-B(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 3000W 200V to 277V AC or 240V to 380V DC Universal high voltage
AC/DC PS, Port-Side Intake

N9K-PUV2-3000W-B(=) Cisco Nexus 9500 3150W 200V to 277V AC or 240V to 380V DC Universal high voltage
AC/DC PS, Port-Side Intake

N9K-C9504-FAN(=) Fan Tray for Cisco Nexus 9504 Chassis

N9K-C9504-FAN2(=) Nexus 9500 4-slot chassis 400G cloud scale fan tray (Generation 2)

N9K-C9504-FAN-PWR(=) Nexus 9500 4-slot chassis 400G cloud scale fan tray power connector

N9K-C9508-FAN(=) Fan Tray for Cisco Nexus 9508 Chassis

N9K-C9508-FAN2(=) Nexus 9500 8-slot chassis 400G cloud scale fan tray (Generation 2)

N9K-C9508-FAN-PWR(=) Nexus 9500 8-slot chassis 400G cloud scale fan tray power connector

N9K-C9516-FAN(=) Fan Tray for Cisco Nexus 9516 Chassis

Accessories

N9K-C9500-RMK= Cisco Nexus 9500 Rack Mount Kit for Nexus 9508 and Nexus 9516 chassis

N9K-C9504-RMK= Cisco Nexus 9500 Rack Mount Kit for Nexus 9504

N9K-C9500-ACK= Cisco Nexus 9500 Accessory Kit

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 12 of 14

Note
All part numbers with “=” sign refer to Spare part numbers for ordering.

Warranty
The Cisco Nexus 9500 platform has a 1-year limited hardware warranty. The warranty includes hardware
replacement with a 10-day turnaround from receipt of a Return Materials Authorization (RMA).

Cisco environmental sustainability

Information about Cisco’s environmental sustainability policies and initiatives for our products, solutions,
operations, and extended operations or supply chain is provided in the “Environment Sustainability” section of
Cisco’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Report.

Reference links to information about key environmental sustainability topics (mentioned in the “Environment
Sustainability” section of the CSR Report) are provided in the following table:

Sustainability topic Reference

Information on product material content laws and regulations Materials

Information on electronic waste laws and regulations, including products, batteries, and packaging WEEE compliance

Cisco makes the packaging data available for informational purposes only. It may not reflect the most current
legal developments, and Cisco does not represent, warrant, or guarantee that it is complete, accurate, or up to
date. This information is subject to change without notice.

Service and Support

Cisco offers a wide range of services to help accelerate your success in deploying and optimizing the Cisco
Nexus 9500 platform in your data center. These innovative Cisco Services offerings are delivered through a
unique combination of people, processes, tools, and partners and are focused on helping you increase
operation efficiency and improve your data center network.

Cisco Advanced Services use an architecture-led approach to help you align your data center infrastructure
with your business goals and achieve long-term value. Cisco SMARTnet™ Service helps you resolve mission-
critical problems with direct access at any time to Cisco network experts and award-winning resources. With
this service, you can take advantage of the Cisco Smart Call Home service, which offers proactive diagnostics
and real-time alerts on your Cisco Nexus 9500 platform switch.

Spanning the entire network lifecycle, Cisco Services offerings help increase investment protection, optimize
network operations, support migration operations, and strengthen your IT expertise.

Cisco Capital
Flexible Payment Solutions to Help You Achieve Your Objectives

Cisco Capital makes it easier to get the right technology to achieve your objectives, enable business
transformation and help you stay competitive. We can help you reduce the total cost of ownership, conserve
capital, and accelerate growth. In more than 100 countries, our flexible payment solutions can help you
acquire hardware, software, services and complementary third-party equipment in easy, predictable
payments. Learn more.

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 13 of 14

For more information
For more information about the Cisco Nexus 9000 Series, please visit https://www.cisco.com/go/nexus9000.

Printed in USA C78-729404-32 04/22

© 2022 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Page 14 of 14