Which dynamic routing protocol reacts faster to changes in the network?

Link State protocols react faster to changes in the network primarily due to their operating mechanism, which allows routers to maintain a more complete and up-to-date picture of the network topology. In Link State protocols, each router periodically sends out Link State Advertisements (LSAs) to all other routers in the network. These advertisements provide detailed information about a router's links and their states.

When a change occurs, such as a router or link going down, routers immediately disseminate LSAs to inform other routers of the change. As a result, the routers can quickly recalculate the best paths based on the new network topology using Dijkstra's algorithm. This means that Link State protocols can achieve convergence more quickly than Distance Vector protocols, which rely on periodic updates and may have a slower reaction time to changes.

In contrast, Distance Vector protocols work by sharing routing tables at regular intervals. They depend on information received from neighboring routers, leading to longer convergence times, especially in larger networks where routing information can take more time to propagate. While Hybrid protocols combine elements of both Distance Vector and Link State, they do not consistently outpace Link State protocols regarding promptness in reacting to topology changes. Static routing remains unchanged unless manually reconfigured, so it is not reactive at all