Selection of member ports in a link aggregation group

A method comprising:

• identifying, by a router including a plurality of line cards connected through a switch fabric internal to the router, a subset of a plurality of member ports included in an aggregation bundle associated with the plurality of line cards within a router, each of the member ports in the subset being reachable through a different data path through the switch fabric internal to the router;
• selecting, by the router and based on evaluating utilization of each of the different data paths through the switch fabric internal to the router, a member port from the subset of the plurality of member ports, wherein selecting the member port includes determining whether the utilization of each of the different data paths is less than a threshold utilization value, and wherein determining the utilization includes evaluating traffic rates for each of the different data paths;
• and
• outputting, by the router, network data over a fabric interface to reach the selected member port.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions that, when executed, configure processing circuitry of a router to:

• identify a subset of a plurality of member ports included in an aggregation bundle associated with a plurality of line cards connected through a switch fabric within a router, each of the member ports in the subset being reachable through a different low-utilization data path through the switch fabric within the router that connects the plurality of line cards;
• select a member port from the subset of the plurality of member ports based on utilization of each of the different low-utilization data paths through the switch fabric internal to the router, wherein to select the member port, the processing circuitry determines whether the utilization of each of the different low-utilization data paths is less than a threshold utilization value, and wherein to determine the utilization, the processing circuitry evaluates traffic rates for each of the different low-utilization data paths;
• and
• output network data over a fabric interface to reach the selected member port.