The smart network topology systems and methods of the present disclosure are aimed at easing network administrator efforts in configuring network configurations to suit their network environment. For instance, the smart network topology system may provide predefined network topology types that an administrator can use when setting up network connectivity between client devices and other network devices such as media agents, storage servers, and the like. Further, the smart network topology system provides the user with a way to customize the routes created between the client computing devices and storage computing devices such that each client computing device is configured to communicate with only those storage computing devices that the client computing device needs to communicate with to perform one or more data protection operations.