consul/website/content/docs/enterprise/read-scale.mdx

---
layout: docs
page_title: Consul Enterprise Enhanced Read Scalability
description: >-
  Consul Enterprise supports increased read scalability without impacting write
  latency by introducing read replicas.
---

# Enhanced Read Scalability with Read Replicas

<EnterpriseAlert>
  This feature requires
  HashiCorp Cloud Platform (HCP) or self-managed Consul Enterprise.
  Refer to the{' '}
  <a href="/docs/enterprise#consul-enterprise-feature-availability">enterprise feature matrix</a>
  {' '}for additional information.
</EnterpriseAlert>

Consul Enterprise provides the ability to scale clustered Consul servers
to include voting servers and read replicas. Read replicas still receive data from the cluster replication,
however, they do not take part in quorum election operations. Expanding your Consul cluster in this way can scale
reads without impacting write latency.

For more details, review the [Consul server configuration](/docs/agent/config)
documentation and the [-read-replica](/docs/agent/config/cli-flags#_read_replica)
configuration flag.