Routing is used to manage and control the flow of traffic within a VPC. It tells the VPC where to send traffic trying to get to a specific destination IP address. Notably, it allows traffic to be automatically routed between resources attached to different Private Networks within the VPC, using their private IP addresses. You can also create your own custom routes.
Read more about the VPC routing feature, including detailed explanations, usage considerations, limitations and best practices in our dedicated reference content.
To complete the actions presented below, you must have:
Routing is activated as standard whenever you create a new VPC.
To activate routing on a pre-existing VPC, follow these steps:
Click VPC in the Network section of the side menu. The list of your VPCs displays.
The Routing column allows you to see whether routing is already activated for a given VPC.
Click Activate next to the VPC on which you want to activate routing.
A message displays warning you that this enables the automatic routing of traffic between the Private Networks of your VPC, and that this action is irreversible.
Type ACTIVATE in the box, and click Activate Routing to confirm.
Routing is activated on the VPC.
Two types of auto-generated routes exist:
Public Gateways remain scoped to the Private Network(s) to which they are attached. They do not advertise the default route on other Private Networks in the VPC. For example, an Instance attached to Private Network A will not be able to access the internet via a Public Gateway in Private Network B.
You cannot edit or delete managed routes, as their lifecycle is fully managed by Scaleway. The route will be automatically deleted for you when you delete the Private Network or Public Gateway that it concerns.
Your VPC’s route table can be found in its Routing tab. The route table shows all the existing routes for the VPC.
Click VPC in the Network section of the side menu. The list of your VPCs displays.
Click a VPC on which you have activated routing.
Click the Routing tab.
Routes are automatically generated and added to the route table when you:
When your route table starts to populate, it will look something like this:
For help with understanding the route table and how to read it, refer to our documentation about route tables.
Scaleway VPC routing supports both IPv4 and IPv6 protocols. Managed routes to Private Networks are simultaneously generated for both IPV4 and IPV6, and both are added to the route table. Use the toggle above the route table to switch from the default view of IPV4 routes to a view of IPV6 routes.
Note that auto-generated managed routes to Public Gateways are only created in IPv4, since Public Gateways are not yet IPv6-compatible. Custom routes are only created for the IP type specified during the creation process.
Each VPC has auto-generated, managed routes to local subnets and Public Gateways, but you can also create your own custom routes.
For example, you may wish to route all traffic for a certain private IP range to an Instance hosting a manually configured VPN tunnel, allowing secure connection to a corresponding subnet at the other end of the tunnel.
Follow the steps below to define a custom route:
Click VPC in the Network section of the side menu. The list of your VPCs displays.
Click a VPC on which you have activated routing.
Click the Routing tab.
Click Create route. The custom route creation wizard displays.
Enter a description for your route, e.g. “Route to hosted VPN”.
Optionally, enter one or more tags for your route. Tags help you filter and organize your list of routes.
Enter a destination for the route. The VPC will apply the route to all traffic with a matching destination IP. You must enter an IPv4 or IPv6 CIDR range with a subnet mask, e.g. 192.168.1.0/24. For a single IP address, use the /32 mask for IPv4.
Enter a next hop for the route. The VPC will route traffic for the destination IP to the resource designated as next hop.
If you entered an IPv6 destination, resources not compatible with IPv6, e.g. Public Gateways, will not be available for selection as next hop.
Click Create route to finish.
The custom route is created and you are returned to the list of your VPC’s routes, where the newly-created route now displays.
If you delete a resource used as a next hop in a custom route, or detach it from the Private Network, the custom route will cease to function. A Not found! warning will display in the Next hop column for this route in the route table.
To resolve this, you must either:
Only custom routes that you created yourself can be edited. It is not possible to edit auto-generated managed routes to Private Networks or Public Gateways.
Click VPC in the Network section of the side menu. The list of your VPCs displays.
Click a VPC on which you have activated routing.
Click the Routing tab.
Click the edit «Edit Icon» icon next to the custom route you want to edit.
Modify the details of the custom route as necessary. You can edit the name, tags, destination IP address range, and next hop.
Click Edit custom route to finish.
The custom route is updated, and you are returned to the list of your VPC’s routes.
Auto-generated managed routes to Private Networks or Public Gateways will be automatically deleted when you delete the Private Network or Public Gateway. However, custom routes that you create yourself are never automatically deleted, even when you delete a resource used as next hop. You must manually delete custom routes yourself when you no longer want them.
It is not possible to manually delete an auto-generated, managed route. Only custom routes can be deleted following the steps below.
Click VPC in the Network section of the side menu. The list of your VPCs displays.
Click a VPC on which you have activated routing.
Click the Routing tab.
Click the delete «Delete Icon» icon next to the custom route you want to delete. A pop-up displays asking you to confirm.
Click Delete route to confirm.
The custom route is deleted, and you are returned to the list of your VPC’s routes.