Specify and manage custom learned routes

Cloud Router learns routes for egress traffic dynamically from its Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) peers. However, you can also manually create such routes and apply them to a BGP session. These manually created routes are called custom learned routes.

You can create custom learned routes at the same time that you create a BGP session. Alternatively, you can update an existing BGP session to add custom learned routes.

For an overview of custom learned routes, see Custom learned routes.

For information about how Cloud Router handles learned routes in general, including routes that are learned dynamically, see Learned routes.

Before you begin

Before you get started, review the following sections.

Select a project

1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.

2. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

   Note: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.

   Go to project selector

3. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

4. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

5. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

   gcloud init

6. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

   Note: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.

   Go to project selector

7. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

8. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

9. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

   gcloud init

4. If you are using the Google Cloud CLI, set your project ID by running the following command. The gcloud instructions on this page assume that you have set your project ID.

   gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID
       

5. Confirm that the ID was set by running the following command:

   gcloud config list --format='text(core.project)'
       

Requirements for IPv6 (optional)

If you want your custom learned routes to include IPv6 prefixes, your connectivity resource must meet the underlying conditions for IPv6. For example, if you're establishing custom learned routes for a VPN tunnel, make sure that you meet the conditions described in IPv6 support in the Cloud VPN overview.

Define custom learned routes while creating a session

For some Network Connectivity products, you can configure a BGP peer to include custom learned routes while you're creating the resource. For other resources, you create the BGP session first and then add the custom learned routes later.

For more information about how to add custom learned routes while creating a session, see the following:

• Create an HA VPN gateway to a peer VPN gateway
• Create VLAN attachments (Dedicated Interconnect)

If you're creating a Partner Interconnect VLAN attachment, create the attachment first, and then update the BGP peer to add custom learned routes.

If you're installing a third-party network virtual appliance by using Network Connectivity Center and you want to use custom learned routes, first install the appliance. Then, for each custom learned route that you want to use, log in to the appliance and configure your Router appliance instance to use the custom learned routes. After that, you can update the BGP session to use custom learned routes. For more information, see Use custom learned routes in the Network Connectivity Center documentation.

When you update a Cloud Router session, the Cloud Router checks for any overlaps between custom learned routes and VPC subnets. If there is an overlap, the VPC subnet takes precedence. This means that traffic is routed through the VPC subnet instead of the custom learned route. Cloud Router ignores BGP and custom learned routes that are more specific than or equal to the VPC subnet. For more information about routing in Google Cloud, see Routes.

If a BGP route and a custom learned route both match the same destination IP address, Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority value. Lower values indicate higher priority.

For information about how to add custom learned routes while updating a BGP session, see the following section.

Update an existing session to use custom learned routes

If you have an existing BGP session that has no custom learned routes defined, you can optionally update it to use custom learned routes.

You can also use this procedure if you have already configured custom learned routes for a session, but you want to add to the IP prefix that you previously specified.

Console

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Cloud Routers page.

   Go to Cloud Routers

2. In the Name field, click the name of the appropriate Cloud Router.

3. On the Router details page, click the name of the BGP session that you want to modify.

4. On the BGP session details page, click Edit.

5. Expand the Advertised routes, custom learned routes, bidirectional forwarding detection (BFD) section, and then in the Custom learned routes section, do the following:

   1. In the Priority of all custom learned routes section, to configure route priority, enter a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session.

      Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. If the same IP address range is configured in multiple custom learned routes, the best path selection is based on the route priority.

   2. Click Add new IP address range.

   3. In the IP address range field, enter an IPv4 or IPv6 prefix. If you provide an IP prefix without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as a /32 subnet mask (for IPv4) and a /128 subnet mask (for IPv6).

6. Click Save.

gcloud

Use the gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer command:

  gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer ROUTER_NAME \
      --peer-name=PEER_NAME \
      --region=REGION \
      --add-custom-learned-route-ranges=IP_PREFIXES \
      --custom-learned-route-priority=ROUTE_PRIORITY

Replace the following:

• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
• PEER_NAME: the name of the BGP peer
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located

• IP_PREFIXES: a list of comma-separated IPv4 or IPv6 prefixes—for example, 1.2.3.4,6.7.0.0,2001:db8:abcd:12::/64

  If you provide an IP prefix without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as, for IPv4, a /32 subnet mask and, for IPv6, /128. For information about the maximum number of custom learned routes that you can have, see Limits.

• ROUTE_PRIORITY: a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session

  Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200. If you don't provide a value, internally Google Cloud applies a value of 100.

API

Use the compute.routers.patch method and update the bgpPeers array.

When you patch the bgpPeers array, you must provide values for every field on every item (unless you want to remove some BGP peers or some values).

For example, suppose the Cloud Router has two BGP peers. To leave the first BGP peer unchanged but add two custom learned routes to the second BGP peer, use a request like the following:

  PATCH https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME
  {
    "bgpPeers": [
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_1",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_1",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_1"
      },
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_2",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_2",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_2",
        "customLearnedRoutePriority": "ROUTE_PRIORITY",
        "customLearnedIpRanges": [
         {
          "range": "IP_PREFIX_1"
         },
         {
          "range": "IP_PREFIX_2"
         }
       ]
      }
    ]
  }

Replace the placeholder values as follows.

Provide values about the Cloud Router:

• PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

Provide values about the BGP peering session that you are not changing:

• PEER_NAME_1: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_1: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_1: the Cloud Router IP address that the BGP session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_1: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

Provide values about the BGP peering session to which you want to add custom learned routes:

• PEER_NAME_2: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_2: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_2: the Cloud Router IP address that the BGP session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_2: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

• ROUTE_PRIORITY: a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session

  Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200. If you don't provide a value, internally Google Cloud applies a value of 100.

• IP_PREFIX_1 and IP_PREFIX_2: for each of these fields, enter an IPv4 or IPv6 prefix

  If you provide an IP prefix without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as, for IPv4, a /32 subnet mask and, for IPv6, /128. For information about the maximum number of custom learned routes that you can have, see Limits.

Overwrite existing custom learned routes

If you want to replace the custom learned routes that are defined for a BGP session, use the following guidance. When you use this procedure, existing custom learned routes are discarded in favor of the new routes that you define.

Console

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Cloud Routers page.

   Go to Cloud Routers

2. In the Name field, click the name of the appropriate Cloud Router.

3. On the Router details page, click the name of the BGP session that you want to modify.

4. On the BGP session details page, click Edit.

5. Expand the Advertised routes, custom learned routes, bidirectional forwarding detection (BFD) section.

6. In the IP address range field, edit the IPv4 or IPv6 prefix. If you provide an IP prefix without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as a /32 subnet mask (for IPv4) and a /128 subnet mask (for IPv6).

7. Click Save.

gcloud

Use the gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer command. You can use the set-custom-learned-route-ranges flag to specify new IP prefixes or to clear previously defined prefixes:

  gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer ROUTER_NAME \
      --peer-name=PEER_NAME \
      --region=REGION \
      --set-custom-learned-route-ranges=IP_PREFIXES

Replace the following:

• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
• PEER_NAME: the name of the BGP peer
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located

• IP_PREFIXES: a list of comma-separated IPv4 or IPv6 prefixes—for example, 1.2.3.4,6.7.0.0,2001:db8:abcd:12::/64

  If you provide an IP prefix without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as, for IPv4, a /32 subnet mask and, for IPv6, /128. To clear all prefixes, use the flag with no value after it. For information about the maximum number of custom learned routes that you can have, see Limits.

API

Use the compute.routers.patch method and update the bgpPeers array.

When you patch the bgpPeers array, you must provide values for every field on every item (unless you want to remove some BGP peers or some values).

For example, suppose the Cloud Router has two peers. Suppose that one does not use custom learned routes but the other does. To leave the first peer unchanged but overwrite the routes that are defined for the second peer, use a request like the following:

  PATCH https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME
  {
    "bgpPeers": [
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_1",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_1",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_1"
      },
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_2",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_2",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_2",
        "customLearnedRoutePriority": "ROUTE_PRIORITY",
        "customLearnedIpRanges": [
          {
           "range": "IP_PREFIX_1"
          },
          {
           "range": "IP_PREFIX_2"
          }
         ]
       }
     ]
   }

Replace the placeholder values as follows.

Provide values about the Cloud Router:

• PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

Provide values about the BGP peering session that you are not changing:

• PEER_NAME_1: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_1: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_1: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_1: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

Provide values about the BGP peering session to which you want to overwrite the custom learned routes:

• PEER_NAME_2: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_2: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_2: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_2: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

• ROUTE_PRIORITY: a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session

  Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200. If you don't provide a value, internally Google Cloud applies a value of 100.

• IP_PREFIX_1 and IP_PREFIX_2: for each of these fields, enter an IPv4 or IPv6 prefix

  If you provide an IP address without a subnet mask, it is interpreted as, for IPv4, a /32 subnet mask and, for IPv6, /128. For information about the maximum number of custom learned routes that you can have, see Limits.

Remove custom learned routes from a BGP session

To remove some or all of the custom learned routes from a BGP session, use the following guidance.

Console

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Cloud Routers page.

   Go to Cloud Routers

2. In the Name field, click the name of the appropriate Cloud Router.

3. On the Router details page, click the name of the BGP session that you want to modify.

4. On the BGP session details page, click Edit.

5. Expand the Advertised routes, custom learned routes, bidirectional forwarding detection (BFD) section.

6. In the Custom learned routes section, next to the IP address range that you want to remove, click Delete IP range.

7. Click Save.

gcloud

Use the gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer command:

  gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer ROUTER_NAME \
      --peer-name=PEER_NAME \
      --region=REGION \
      --remove-custom-learned-route-ranges=IP_PREFIXES

Replace the following:

• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
• PEER_NAME: the name of the BGP peer
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
• IP_PREFIXES: a comma-separated list of the IP prefixes that you want to remove

API

Use the compute.routers.patch method and update the bgpPeers array.

When you patch the bgpPeers array, you must provide values for every field on every item (unless you want to remove some BGP peers or some values).

For example, suppose the Cloud Router has two BGP peers. Suppose that one does not use custom learned routes but the other does. To leave the first peer unchanged and remove the routes that are defined for the second peer, use a request like the following:

  PATCH https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME
  {
    "bgpPeers": [
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_1",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_1",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_1"
      },
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_2",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_2",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_2"
      }
    ]
  }

Replace the placeholder values as follows.

Provide values about the Cloud Router:

• PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

Provide values about the BGP peering session that you are not changing:

• PEER_NAME_1: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_1: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_1: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_1: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

Provide values about the BGP peering session from which you want to remove custom learned routes:

• PEER_NAME_2: the name of the session
• INTERFACE_NAME_2: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_2: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_2: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

Change the priority for all custom learned routes on a BGP session

If you want to update a BGP session to use a different priority for its custom learned routes, use the following guidance. Be aware that priority always applies to all custom routes defined for a BGP peer; you can't apply different priorities to different IP prefixes.

Console

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Cloud Routers page.

   Go to Cloud Routers

2. In the Name field, click the name of the appropriate Cloud Router.

3. On the Router details page, click the name of the BGP session that you want to modify.

4. On the BGP session details page, click Edit.

5. Expand the Advertised routes, custom learned routes, bidirectional forwarding detection (BFD) section.

6. In the Priority of all custom learned routes field, to edit route priority, enter a new priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session.

   Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. If the same IP address range is configured in multiple custom learned routes, the best path selection is based on the route priority.

7. Click Save.

gcloud

Use the gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer command:

  gcloud compute routers update-bgp-peer ROUTER_NAME \
      --peer-name=PEER_NAME \
      --region=REGION \
      --custom-learned-route-priority=NEW_ROUTE_PRIORITY

Replace the following:

• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
• PEER_NAME: the name of the BGP peer
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located

• NEW_ROUTE_PRIORITY: a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session

  Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200.

API

Use the compute.routers.patch method and update the bgpPeers array.

When you patch the bgpPeers array, you must provide values for every field on every item, unless you want to remove some BGP peers or some values.

For example, suppose the Cloud Router has two BGP peers. To leave the first peer unchanged but update the priority of the two custom learned routes defined for the second peer, use a request like the following:

  PATCH https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME
  {
    "bgpPeers": [
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_1",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_1",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_1"
      },
      {
        "name": "PEER_NAME_2",
        "interfaceName": "INTERFACE_NAME_2",
        "ipAddress": "IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerIpAddress": "PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2",
        "peerAsn": "PEER_ASN_2",
        "customLearnedRoutePriority": "NEW_ROUTE_PRIORITY",
        "customLearnedIpRanges": [
          {
           "range": "IP_PREFIX_1"
          },
          {
           "range": "IP_PREFIX_2"
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }

Replace the placeholder values as follows.

Provide values about the Cloud Router:

• PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
• REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
• ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

Provide values about the BGP peering session that you are not changing:

• PEER_NAME_1: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_1: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_1: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_1: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_1: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

Provide values about the BGP peering session for which you want to change the priority:

• PEER_NAME_2: the name of the BGP session
• INTERFACE_NAME_2: the name of the interface that the session uses
• IP_ADDRESS_2: the Cloud Router IP address that the session uses
• PEER_IP_ADDRESS_2: the IP address of the BGP peer
• PEER_ASN_2: the autonomous system number (ASN) for the session

• NEW_ROUTE_PRIORITY: a priority value between 0 and 65535 (inclusive) for all the custom learned routes configured for this session

  Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200.

• IP_PREFIX_1 and IP_PREFIX_2: the IP prefixes that are already defined for the BGP session

Check the status of custom learned routes

To check the status of your custom learned routes, use the following guidance.

Console

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Cloud Routers page.

   Go to Cloud Routers

2. In the Name field, click the name of the appropriate Cloud Router.

3. On the Router details page, click the name of the BGP session that you want to modify.

4. On the BGP session details page, click Edit.

5. Expand the Advertised routes, custom learned routes, bidirectional forwarding detection (BFD) section.

6. To view the route priority, see the Priority of all custom learned routes field.

   Google Cloud gives greater preference to routes that have smaller priority values. That is, a route with a priority of 100 is given greater preference than one with a priority of 200.

7. To view the IP address ranges, see the IP address range fields.

gcloud

1. To check the configuration of your BGP sessions, use the gcloud compute routers describe command. For example:

   gcloud compute routers describe ROUTER_NAME \
       --region=REGION

   Replace the following:

   • ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
   • REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located

   The output of the command includes the IP prefixes and priority that are configured for each BGP session.

2. To see whether any of your custom learned routes are considered best routes for the router, use the gcloud compute routers get-status command:

   gcloud compute routers get-status ROUTER_NAME \
       --region=REGION

   Replace the following:

   • ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router
   • REGION: the Google Cloud region

   The output lists the best routes for the Cloud Router and tells you the state of each BGP session.

API

1. To retrieve BGP session configuration details, use the routers.get method:

   GET https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME
   

   Replace the following:

   • PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
   • REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
   • ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

   The bgpPeers field in the output contains the configuration for each BGP session.

2. Use the routers.getRouterStatus method:

   GET https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/regions/REGION/routers/ROUTER_NAME/getRouterStatus
   

   Replace the following:

   • PROJECT_ID: the project that contains the Cloud Router
   • REGION: the region where the Cloud Router is located
   • ROUTER_NAME: the name of the Cloud Router

   The output lists the best routes for the Cloud Router and tells you the state of each BGP session.

What's next

• For help understanding the state of a BGP session, see BGP session states.

• To troubleshoot issues with Cloud Router, see Troubleshooting.