# Disaster Recovery Planning: Geographic Diversity

Source: https://expedient.com/knowledgebase/blog/2014-11-10-what-do-you-have-to-gain-from-geographic-diversity/

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# Disaster Recovery Planning: Geographic Diversity

November 10, 2014 2 min Read

## What Do You Have to Gain From Geographic Diversity?

- In the world of data centers, what is geographic diversity, and why is it significant?

Geographic diversity is an important disaster recovery term—it describes adequate distance between primary and secondary (or backup) sites.

- Why is geographic diversity important?

Geographic diversity is imperative when it comes to disaster recovery planning. Primary and secondary sites should have enough distance between each other to minimize the potential for a disaster, such as an outage or fire, to take down both sites.

#### How Do You Determine the Right Distance to Ensure Geographic Diversity?

Keeping your secondary site relatively close to your primary site makes things easier from the standpoint of being able to make use of your staff and backup services, but a natural disaster such as a storm, could damage both sites simultaneously. There are varying opinions as to how far a secondary site should be from a primary site; however, there are also many different requirements that must be addressed when establishing the appropriate distance.

A common recommendation for distance between primary and secondary sites is typically between 60-100 miles, but the best distance for you often depends on your business requirements. To learn more about geographic diversity and disaster recovery planning, [download this DR checklist](http://bit.ly/1kip3Vy) and [contact an expert](https://www.expedient.com/support/) today.

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 ![AJ Kuftic](https://res.cloudinary.com/dvlpy3tua/image/upload/fl_sanitize/uploads/kuftic-aj.jpg)
AJ KufticPrincipal Product Strategist•Product Strategy

 ](/knowledgebase/blog/authors/aj-kuftic)
[Disaster Recovery](/knowledgebase/blog/tag/disaster%20recovery)[Data Centers](/knowledgebase/blog/tag/data%20centers)

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