Use the vMotion TCP/IP stack to isolate traffic for vSphere vMotion and to assign a dedicated default gateway for vSphere vMotion traffic.

By using a separate TCP/IP stack, you can manage vSphere vMotion and cold migration traffic according to the topology of the network, and as required by your organization.

  • Route the traffic for the migration of virtual machines that are powered on or powered off by using a default gateway that is different from the gateway assigned to the default stack on the ESXi host.

  • Assign a separate set of buffers and sockets.

  • Avoid routing table conflicts that might otherwise appear when many features are using a common TCP/IP stack.

  • Isolate traffic to improve security.

Table 1. Design Decisions on the vMotion TCP/IP Stack

Decision ID

Design Decision

Design Justification

Design Implication

SDDC-WLD-VI-NET-007

Use the vMotion TCP/IP stack for vSphere vMotion traffic.

By using the vMotion TCP/IP stack, vSphere vMotion traffic can be assigned a default gateway on its own subnet and can go over Layer 3 networks.

In the vSphere Client, the vMotion TCP/IP stack is not available in the wizard for creating a VMkernel network adapter wizard at the distributed port group level. You must create the VMkernel adapter directly on the ESXi host.