I noticed there are some switches called "Layer-3 Switch", which is able to do both switching and routing.
I have seen some articles that says Layer-3 switch can replace routers. Is it going to replace both routers and managed switches in future? Or are there still some routing functions that Layer-3 switch cannot achieve?
Best Answer
Layer-3 switches can do layer-3 routing along with layer-2 switching.
Whether or not a layer-3 switch can replace a router depends on the switch model and what you need it to do. Some layer-3 switches are very complete router replacements, with a full range of WAN, firewall, VoIP, etc. modules. On the other hand, those switches are expensive, and most layer-3 switches only have ethernet ports. There can be things that dedicated routers do better than most layer-3 switches.
YLearn has a good explanation in an answer for this question.