Troubleshooting ESXi VLAN Configurations using Command Line Tools

There are a few ways to troubleshoot network/VLAN configuration from a command line, using tools such as ESXCLI and vicfg/esxcfg either locally on the ESXi host or remotely using vCLI or the vMA. Here, I’ll aim to give examples using esxcfg commands ran from a vMA, and ESXCLI commands executed locally on the ESXi host.

Listing Port Group Settings

~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup list
Name                Virtual Switch  Active Clients  VLAN ID
------------------  --------------  --------------  -------
Management Network  vSwitch0                     1        0
VM Network          vSwitch3                     0        0
vMotion             vSwitch0                     1        0

vi-admin@vma:~[192.168.88.134]> esxcfg-vswitch -l
Switch Name     Num Ports       Used Ports      Configured Ports    MTU     Uplinks
vSwitch0        128             5               128                 1500    vmnic1,vmnic0

   PortGroup Name                VLAN ID   Used Ports      Uplinks
   vMotion                       0         1               vmnic1
   Management Network            0         1               vmnic0

Switch Name     Num Ports       Used Ports      Configured Ports    MTU     Uplinks
vSwitch3        128             3               128                 1500    vmnic7,vmnic6

   PortGroup Name                VLAN ID   Used Ports      Uplinks
   VM Network                    0         0               vmnic7,vmnic6

DVS Name                 Num Ports   Used Ports  Configured Ports  Uplinks
DSwitch1                 256         5           256               vmnic4,vmnic5,vmnic8,vmnic9

   DVPort ID           In Use      Client
   8                   1           vmnic4
   9                   1           vmnic9
   10                  1           vmnic8
   11                  1           vmnic5
   0                   0
   1                   0

Configuring VLAN Tags

~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup set -p vMotion --vlan-id 10
~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup list
Name                Virtual Switch  Active Clients  VLAN ID
------------------  --------------  --------------  -------
Management Network  vSwitch0                     1        0
VM Network          vSwitch3                     0        0
vMotion             vSwitch0                     1       10

vi-admin@vma:~[192.168.88.134]> esxcfg-vswitch vSwitch0 -p vMotion -v 0

Adding and Removing Port Groups

esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup add -p testpg -v vSwitch0
~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup set -p testpg --vlan-id 1000
~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup list
Name                Virtual Switch  Active Clients  VLAN ID
------------------  --------------  --------------  -------
Management Network  vSwitch0                     1        0
VM Network          vSwitch3                     0        0
testpg              vSwitch0                     0     1000
vMotion             vSwitch0                     1        0

esxcfg-vswitch --add-pg testpg vSwitch1

To delete a port group:

~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup remove -p testpg -v vSwitch0
~ # esxcli network vswitch standard portgroup list
Name                Virtual Switch  Active Clients  VLAN ID
------------------  --------------  --------------  -------
Management Network  vSwitch0                     1        0
VM Network          vSwitch3                     0        0
vMotion             vSwitch0                     1        0

esxcfg-vswitch --del-pg testpg vSwitch1