It pushes a 20 Mbps data rate on the bus, which puts it in the high-speed tier for RS-485 — short cable runs, high-throughput links like backplane or motor-drive encoder interfaces. The 30 mV receiver hysteresis keeps noise immunity solid on a differential pair that might see a few hundred millivolts of common-mode wander.
At 20 Mbps the SN65HVD3086EDGSG4 is a fast RS-485 part. That data rate comes with a cable-length trade: you can run a few meters at full speed, but if your link stretches beyond 50 feet you'll need to drop the baud rate or add a repeater. The full-duplex architecture means separate twisted pairs for transmit and receive — no direction-toggle overhead, which is handy for continuous streaming or polled multi-drop where the master never stops talking. The 5 V-only supply rail is a firm constraint: this part won't run on 3.3 V logic, so if your MCU is 3.3 V you'll need level translation on the digital side or a separate 5 V rail for the bus transceiver.
If you're dual-sourcing, TI's own SN65HVD3086 family includes other package variants (SOIC, MSOP) that share the same core — but the EDGSG4 suffix is the 10-VSSOP tape-and-reel variant, so verify the package code matches your board's land pattern.