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Networking

The Networking tab is the per-project home for VPCs, subnets, routers, security groups, public IPs, load balancers, and VPN gateways. The console groups related objects under sub-tabs.

Overview

Networking landing Networking tab. Sub-tabs across the top: VPCs · Subnets · Routers · Security Groups · Floating IPs · Load Balancers · VPN Gateways.

Sub-tabs:

Sub-tab What lives here
VPCs Virtual private clouds — the top-level network container
Subnets IP ranges + AZ pinning + DHCP config
Routers Logical routers between subnets and external gateways
Security Groups Stateful firewall rules attached to ENIs
Floating IPs Persistent public IPv4 addresses (and dual-stack IPv6)
Load Balancers L4 (Network) and L7 (Application) load balancers
VPN Gateways IPsec / IKEv2 gateways for site-to-site and client VPN

The default VPC (10.0.0.0/16, one subnet per AZ) is created for every new project — you can ignore it and define your own.

Administration

Quotas

Project Settings → Quota → Networking:

Resource Default per project Cap
VPCs 5 50
Subnets per VPC 50 200
Security groups per VPC 250 500
Rules per security group 60 200
Public IPv4 25 bumpable
Floating IPs (reserved) 25 bumpable
Load balancers 25 bumpable
NAT gateways per AZ 5 25

CIDR planning

Pick non-overlapping CIDRs across your projects if you ever plan to peer them. The default 10.0.0.0/16 is fine for prototypes; production should use a documented CIDR plan that doesn't collide with your on-prem RFC1918 ranges or any future cross-VPC peering.

Default security group policy

Every VPC gets a default security group with these rules:

  • Inbound: deny all
  • Outbound: allow all

This is intentionally strict on inbound. Customize per project — typically open SSH from your bastion / VPN range, and HTTP/HTTPS for public-facing tiers.

Operation

Creating a VPC

VPCs → + Create VPC:

  1. Name
  2. CIDR block/16 to /24
  3. Region
  4. Subnets — at least one (you can add more later)
  5. Tags

Adding a subnet

Subnets → + Create Subnet — pick the parent VPC, AZ, CIDR within the VPC's range, and gateway address.

Creating a security group

Security Groups → + Create Group → name + description.

Then + Add rule:

  • Direction — Ingress / Egress
  • Protocol — TCP / UDP / ICMP / Any / specific (e.g. ESP)
  • Port range22, 80-90, 8000-9000, etc.
  • Source (ingress) / Destination (egress) — CIDR or another security group ID
  • Description — short note for the rule (audit-friendly)

Attach the group to ENIs via Servers → pick VM → Security Groups → +.

Allocating a floating IP

Floating IPs → + Reserve floating IP:

  • Pool — General / BDIX-only / BYOIP
  • Address family — IPv4 / IPv6
  • Tags

Then Associate with a VM, LB, or NAT gateway. Idle reserved IPv4 incurs a small per-hour charge; IPv6 is free.

Creating a load balancer

Load Balancers → + Create Load Balancer:

  1. Name
  2. Type — Network (L4) / Application (L7)
  3. Scheme — Internet-facing / Internal
  4. Subnets — pick the subnets the LB lives in (one per AZ for HA)
  5. Listeners — protocols + ports + (for L7) routing rules
  6. Target group — backends + health check config

L7 features (path/host routing, sticky sessions, TLS termination with managed cert) are configured under the LB's detail panel after creation.

Setting up a VPN

VPN Gateways → + Create Gateway:

  1. Name + Tier (Small 500 Mbps / Medium 1.5 Gbps / Large 5 Gbps / XL 10 Gbps)
  2. VPC + subnets (placed in an HA pair)
  3. Tunnel mode — Site-to-site IPsec / IKEv2 client VPN
  4. Peer config — far-side IP, PSK or certificate, IKE / ESP params

Once provisioned, generate the peer configuration (downloadable as a .conf you give to your far-end network team) and bring up tunnels.

Troubleshooting

Symptom Likely cause Fix
Cannot reach VM from internet Security group denies inbound; or no floating IP attached; or NACL blocks Check the security group on the VM's ENI; confirm public IP attached; review NACL on the subnet
Cannot reach private VM from public VM in the same VPC Security groups blocking cross-tier; or different subnets without a route Add a security-group rule (source = the other group's ID); confirm the route table
Floating IP shows "associated" but VM unreachable OS-side firewall (iptables, Windows Firewall) blocking Check inside the VM (sudo ufw status); allow the relevant ports
Load Balancer target shows Unhealthy Health-check path returns non-2xx, or wrong port, or security group on target blocks LB Test the health check directly from the LB subnet; allow inbound from the LB's security group
VPN tunnel won't come up IKE / ESP param mismatch with peer Both sides must agree; compare phase-1 and phase-2 settings exactly
NAT gateway egress drops on large transfers NAT gateway port-allocation per-source-IP exhausted Use a multi-NAT-gateway pattern; or move egress to an LB pattern; or check for retry storms
New VPC peering still failing after Accept Routes not added in both VPCs' route tables Add explicit routes for the peer CIDR in both directions

For BDIX-direct topologies, see BDIX Peering Direct Connect — that's not a self-service Console flow (it requires a fibre cross-connect).

Pricing

  • VPC, subnets, security groups, NACLs — free
  • Public IPv4 attached to a running VM — free (one per VM); extra/idle — per-hour
  • NAT gateway — per-hour + per-GB
  • Load balancer — per-hour + LCU + international egress
  • VPN — per-gateway-hour + international egress
  • Floating IP (reserved, unattached IPv4) — per-hour

See Pricing model.