The Cisco 4000 Series is built on a multicore CPU architecture. It runs modular Cisco IOS XE Software, which allows the platform to use to full advantage a distributed multicore architecture. The architecture of the Cisco 4000 Series separates control- and data-plane operations and integrates an industry-first services plane. This design delivers full-featured integrated services up to Layer 7 at high performance, with the ability to deliver application-aware network services while maintaining a stable platform and a high level of performance during periods of heavy network traffic.

- It is an application-aware platform complete with Intelligent Path Control (PfR), application visibility (NBAR2) and Network Contention Control (H/QoS).
- It comes with Cisco IOS built-in security features for complete branch threat defense, such as Zone-based Firewall, FirePOWER Threat Defense, Network Address Translation (NAT), and IPSec VPN
- It is a standard-based Linux virtualization platform. With Linux Virtual Container (LXC), signed network service like Snort IPS can be spin up as virtual machine any time
- It is equipped with up to 2×8 integrated switch ports – a true all-in-one platform – for pop-up or micro branches where the average square footage is as little as 350-sf.
- It supports IPv6 and legacy WAN connectivity, such as 3G/4G LTE, for IoT use cases such as ATM/Kiosk or industrial environments without dedicated MPLS transport