An approach is provided that responds to a connection request to connect to an external network entity using a connection from a managed connection pool. The connection pool is managed by selecting connections from the connection pool that includes one or more currently unused connections with the external network entity. One of the selected connections is validated by comparing an idle time associated with each of the selected connections to a maximum idle time value corresponding to the external network entity. The maximum idle time value being previously identified at the information handling system. The validated connection is then used to connect to the external network entity to satisfy the connection request.