Inter-VLAN Routing – What’s the Advantage of Having VLANs?

routingSecurityvlan

If you configure VLANs with each having their own subnets, is there a point to have them if inter-vlan routing is enabled? Since VLANs will have access to other VLANs, the security argument is not applicable. I guess broadcast traffic isn't routed between the VLANs?

What are other reasons why VLANs are still interesting in this case?

Best Answer

  • If you've got inter-VLAN routing, there's a single point - the router - where you can control the traffic. Of course, you could have two or even more routers for redundancy (a low number) but you could have dozens of switches.
  • Splitting your network in e.g. client and server subnets allows you to very conveniently apply different security policies to each subnet (zone), e.g. on the firewall.
  • A client can rather easily fake its IP address within the same subnet (unless you've implemented rigid measures like DHCP snooping and MAC binding), but it can't fake its VLAN/subnet membership.
  • Even medium-sized networks pretty much require multiple subnets/VLANs for scalability.
  • There may be many other reasons why you'd want to separate VLANs (geography, limit broadcast domain, separate management, ...) while still allowing them to communicate with each other.

I guess broadcast traffic isn't routed between the VLANs?

Limited broadcasts (to 255.255.255.255) are generally limited to the VLAN = broadcast domain. Directed subnet broadcasts (to e.g. 192.168.0.255/24) may be routed if your routers are configured that way.