Which plane builds and maintains the network topology and makes decisions on traffic flows?

The data plane is responsible for forwarding user traffic according to the instructions received from the control plane, not for building the topology or making flow decisions.

The orchestration plane handles the initial onboarding and authentication of SD-WAN devices, allowing them to connect to the network, but does not build the topology or make traffic flow decisions.

The management plane provides a centralized interface for configuring, monitoring, and troubleshooting the entire SD-WAN network, but it does not directly manage the topology or traffic flow decisions.

The control plane, primarily handled by vSmart controllers in Cisco SD-WAN, is responsible for building and maintaining the overlay network topology, distributing routes, and enforcing policy decisions that govern traffic flows.