Create standard switches

During an ESXi installation a virtual switch named vSwitch0 is created. It contains two port groups: one for virtual machines (named VM Network) and one for management (named Management Network). You can use the vSphere Web Client to add a new virtual switch. Here are the steps:

1. Log into vCenter Server through vSphere Web Client.

2. Go to vCenter > Hosts And Clusters and select an ESXi host from the inventory:

selecting esxi host

3. Click the Manage tab and select Networking:

manage networking esxi

4. Click the Add host networking icon:

esxi add host networking

5. The Add Networking wizard opens. Select Virtual Machine Port Group for a Standard Switch as the connection type:

esxi add networking connection type

6. Select New standard switch and click Next:

esxi add networking new standard switch

7. Click the green plus icon under Assigned adapters to assign a physical network adapter:

esxi add networking add adapter

8. Under Failover Order Group, select Unused adapters and select an unused network adapter:

esxi add networking add unused adapter

9. Move the entry from the Unused adapters section to the Active adapters section using the blue up arrow and click Next:

esxi add networking add active adapter

10. Type a network label for the default port group that will be added to this switch. If you are using multiple ESXi hosts with vCenter and vMotion, make sure that this network label is consistent across all of your ESXi hosts. You can keep the default setting for VLAN ID.

esxi add networking network label

11. Click Finish to add the new switch:

esxi add networking finish

The new virtual switch should be listed under Virtual switches:

esxi virtual switches

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