Configuring Multiple VLAN Interfaces on Windows

In this article, we’ll show how to configure a tagged VLAN interface on Windows 10/11 and Windows Server 2019 (2022/2016/2012R2). The VLAN (Virtual LAN) specification is described in the IEEE 802.1Q standard and involves marking traffic with tags (vlanid) so that a network packet may be referred to a particular virtual network. VLANs are used to separate and segment networks, restrict broadcast domains, and isolate network segments to improve security. On Windows, you can configure multiple logical network interfaces with different VLAN ID on a single physical NIC using different tools.

In order to use VLAN on Windows, you need to reconfigure the physical switch port to which your computer/server is connected to. The port must be switched from access mode to trunk mode. By default, all VLANs are allowed on a trunk port, but you can set the list of allowed VLAN numbers (1 to 4094) available at this Ethernet switch port.

Creating Multiple VLAN Interfaces on Windows 10 and 11

Windows desktop editions don’t natively support VLAN tagging. By default, most network adapter drivers ignore all VLAN tags in network packets and external VLANs become inaccessible.

For some network adapters, you can set the VLAN number in the driver properties:

1. Run the Device Manager (devmgmt.msc);
2. Expand the Network adapters section and open the properties of your network adapter;
3. Go to the Advanced tab and find the VLAN ID option;
4. You can set the VLAN number here;
5. For some NICs, you first need to enable the Packet Priority and VLAN option.

In modern versions of Windows 10 and 11, you can set one VLAN tag for a network interface adapter. You can use PowerShell to manage network settings.  For example, you want to set VLAN ID 24 for your network interface named Ethernet0:

Set-NetAdapter –Name "Ethernet0" -VlanID 24

For some NICs (from Intel, Broadcom, HP, Realtek), special tools are available that allow you to create a virtual network interface in Windows with a VLAN ID. To do this, you need to install a special driver on your computer that supports 802.1Q tagged traffic and the official configuration tool from the vendor.

Create Multiple VLANs on a Realtek NIC in Windows 10 or 11

For Realtek NICs, you can configure multiple virtual NICs with different VLANs using the Realtek Ethernet Diagnostic Utility. Find the description of your Realtek network controller on the vendor’s website, and check that this model supports VLAN. For example, the specification for the RTL8169SC(L) network controller has this option:

Supports IEEE 802.1Q VLAN tagging

Download and install the latest network driver for your Realtek adapter and run the Realtek Ethernet Diagnostic Utility (Diagnostic Program for Win7/Win8/Win10/Win11).

Go to the VLAN section, click Add and add the required VLAN ID. After that, a new network interface will appear in Windows.

After creating network interfaces for your VLANs, you can assign the IP addresses from the corresponding IP network.

How to Setup VLAN on an Intel Ethernet Network Adapter?

Intel has its own Intel Advanced Network Services (Intel® ANS) tool for configuring VLAN interfaces. Your network adapter model, of course, must support VLAN (for example, VLAN is not supported for NICs such as Intel PRO/100 or PRO/1000). When installing the driver, select the Intel PROSet for Windows Device Manager and Advanced Network Services options.

Then a separate VLANs tab appears in the properties of your physical Intel network adapter, where you can create multiple VLAN interfaces.

However, this method works on all previous versions of Windows (up to Windows 10 1809). In modern Windows 10/11 builds, the following message is displayed in the VLANs tab:

Intel(R) Advanced Network (Intel(R) ANS) Teams and VLANs are not supported on Microsoft Windows 10.

Intel recently released new network adapter drivers and the Intel PROSet adapter configuration tool for the latest builds of Windows 10 and 11. Download and install the latest Intel driver and Intel PROset utility.

Run the configuration tool, go to the Teaming/VLANs tab, click the New button, and specify the name of the network interface and its VLANID.

In addition, you can add/remove/view the list of VLANs on Intel NICs using the PowerShell cmdlets from the IntelNetCmdlets module. Import the module into your PowerShell session:

Import-Module -Name "C:\Program Files\Intel\Wired Networking\IntelNetCmdlets\IntelNetCmdlets" -Scope Local

You can create an untagged virtual network adapter (usually used with native-vlan-id):

Add-IntelNetVLAN -ParentName "Intel(R) Ethernet Connection I219-LM" -VLANID 0

To create an Intel NIC with a specific VLAN number:

Add-IntelNetVLAN -ParentName "Intel(R) Ethernet Connection I219-LM" -VLANID 103

To list all virtual Intel network adapters:

Get-NetAdapter

Remove VLAN interface:

Remove-IntelNetVLAN -ParentName "Intel(R) Ethernet Connection I219-LM" -VLANID 103

How to Configure Multiple VLANs on Windows Server 2022/2019/2016?

In Windows Server 2022/2019/2016/2012R2, you can configure multiple VLANs on the same network interface using built-in tools (without installing third-party drivers and tools). Let’s try to configure multiple VLANs on the same physical NIC in Windows Server 2019 using NIC Teaming.

1. Open the Server Manager -> Local and click the NIC Teaming link;
2. In the Teams section, click Task -> New Team. Specify the group name and select network adapters to add;
   You can create a NIC Teaming group using PowerShell:
   New-NetLbfoTeam -Name vTeam -TeamMembers "Ethernet1","Ethernet2" -TeamingMode SwitchIndependent -LoadBalancingAlgorithm Dynamic
3. Then in the “Adapter and Interfaces” section, add virtual network interfaces. Click Tasks -> Add Interface;
4. Enter the name of the interface you are going to create and a VLAN number;
   You can add a network interface and set a VLAN for it in PowerShell:
   Add-NetLbfoTeamNic -Team vTeam -VlanID 24 -Name VLAN24
5. In the same way, you can add as many VLAN network interfaces as you need;
   Please note that Windows Server 2022/2019/2016 supports a maximum of 32 NICs (and unique VLANs) per NIC Teaming group.
6. A separate virtual network adapter will appear in the list of network connections in ncpa.cpl;
7. Now you can configure the IP settings for each VLAN interface in the properties of the network adapter or using PowerShell cmdlets:
   New-NetIPAddress -InterfaceAlias your_VLAN_interface -IPAddress 192.168.10.10 -PrefixLength 24 -DefaultGateway 192.168.10.1
Set-DnsClientServerAddress -InterfaceAlias your_VLAN_interface -ServerAddresses 192.168.100.12

Create Multiple VLANs with Windows Hyper-V Role

You can programmatically handle multiple VLANs in Windows through the Hyper-V subsystem (available in both Windows Server and desktop Windows 10/11 Pro and Enterprise editions). You can create a virtual switch with a network adapter in a specific VLAN.

To do this, you need to install Hyper-V components:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName:Microsoft-Hyper-V -All

Create a new virtual switch through Hyper-V Manager or using PowerShell commands (see an example in the article on how to configure Hyper-V Server).

Then run the following commands for each VLAN you want to create:

Add-VMNetworkAdapter -ManagementOS -Name VLAN24 -StaticMacAddress "11-11-AA-BB-CC-DD" -SwitchName vSwitch2
Set-VMNetworkAdapterVlan -ManagementOS -VMNetworkAdapterName VLAN24 -Access -VlanId 24

So a network adapter with the VLAN you want will appear in Windows.

If you have VMs running on your Hyper-V server, you can put them in different VLANs. To switch the virtual network adapter of a VM on Hyper-V to Access mode and allow it to receive traffic only with a specific VLAN ID, use the command:

Set-VMNetworkAdapterVlan -VMName MyVMName1 -Access -VlanId 30

Display a list of VMs and their assigned VLANs:

Get-VMNetworkAdapterVLAN

In Windows Server 2022 with the Hyper-V role, you won’t be able to bind a virtual switch to such a teaming interface. The fact is that LBFO NIC Teaming is a deprecated feature on Windows Server 2022 (https://aka.ms/lbfodeprecation). Instead of NIC Teaming, it is proposed to use Switch Embedded Teaming (SET).

Let’s create a virtual adapter and assign a VLAN to it on Windows Server 2022 Hyper-V using SET.

Create a virtual switch connected to the host’s physical adapters:

New-VMSwitch -Name HVVLANSwitch1 -NetAdapterName "Ethernet3","Ethernet4" -EnableEmbeddedTeaming $true

Now create a virtual adapter connected to the virtual switch:

Add-VMNetworkAdapter -ManagementOS -Name "VLAN22" -StaticMacAddress "XX-XX-XX-XX-XX-XX" -SwitchName HVVLANSwitch1

Assign a VLAN tag to your virtual adapter:

Set-VMNetworkAdapterVlan -ManagementOS -VMNetworkAdapterName "VLAN22" -Access -VlanId 22

You can enable the virtual Hyper-V adapter to receive packets from multiple VLANs using the command:

Get-VMNetworkAdapter -Name youradaptername | Set-VMNetworkAdapterVlan -Trunk -AllowedVlanIdList 40-69 -NativeVlanId 0