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Create a mesh network topology with Azure Virtual Network Manager

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  • 3 minutes to read

In this article, you'll learn how to create a mesh network topology using Azure Virtual Network Manager. With this configuration, all the virtual networks of the same region in the same network group can communicate with one another. You can enable cross region connectivity by enabling the global mesh setting in the connectivity configuration.

Important

Azure Virtual Network Manager is generally available for Virtual Network Manager and hub and spoke connectivity configurations.

Mesh connectivity configurations and security admin rules remain in public preview. This preview version is provided without a service level agreement, and it's not recommended for production workloads. Certain features might not be supported or might have constrained capabilities. For more information, see Supplemental Terms of Use for Microsoft Azure Previews.

Prerequisites

Create a network group

This section will help you create a network group containing the virtual networks you'll be using for the mesh network topology.

  1. Go to your Azure Virtual Network Manager instance. This how-to guide assumes you've created one using the quickstart guide.

  2. Select Network Groups under Settings, then select + Create.

    Screenshot of add a network group button.

  3. On the Create a network group page, enter a Name for the network group. This example will use the name myNetworkGroup. Select Add to create the network group.

    Screenshot of create a network group page.

  4. You'll see the new network group added to the Network Groups page. Screenshot of network group page with list of network groups.

  5. Once your network group is created, you'll add virtual networks as members. Choose one of the options: Manually add membership or Create policy to dynamically add members.

Define network group members

Azure Virtual Network manager allows you two methods for adding membership to a network group. You can manually add virtual networks or use Azure Policy to dynamically add virtual networks based on conditions. This how-to covers manually adding membership. For information on defining group membership with Azure Policy, see Define network group membership with Azure Policy.

Manually adding members

To manually add the desired virtual networks for your Mesh configuration to your Network Group, follow the steps below:

  1. From the list of network groups, select your network group and select Add virtual networks under Manually add members on the network group page.

    Screenshot of add a virtual network.

  2. On the Manually add members page, select all the virtual networks and select Add.

    Screenshot of add virtual networks to network group page.

  3. To review the network group membership manually added, select Group Members on the Network Group page under Settings. Screenshot of group membership under Group Membership.

Create a mesh connectivity configuration

This section will guide you through how to create a mesh configuration with the network group you created in the previous section.

  1. Select Configurations under Settings, then select + Create.

    Screenshot of the configurations list.

  2. Select Connectivity configuration from the drop-down menu.

    Screenshot of configuration drop-down menu.

  3. On the Add a connectivity configuration page, enter the following information:

    Screenshot of add a connectivity configuration page.

    Setting Value
    Name Enter a name for this configuration.
    Description Optional Enter a description about what this configuration will do.

  4. Select Next: Topology > and select Mesh as the topology. Then select + Add under Network groups.

    Screenshot of Add a connectivity configuration page and options.

  5. On the Add network groups page, select the network groups you want to add to this configuration. Then select Select to save.

  6. Select Review + create and then Create to create the mesh connectivity configuration.

Deploy the mesh configuration

To have this configuration take effect in your environment, you'll need to deploy the configuration to the regions where your selected virtual networks are created.

  1. Select Deployments under Settings, then select Deploy configuration.

  2. On the Deploy a configuration page, select the following settings:

    Screenshot of deploy a configuration page.

    Setting Value
    Configurations Select Include connectivity configurations in your goal state.
    Connectivity Configurations Select the name of the configuration you created in the previous section.
    Target regions Select all the regions where the configuration will be applied to virtual networks.

  3. Select Next and then select Deploy to commit the configuration to the selected regions.

  4. The deployment of the configuration can take several minutes, select the Refresh button to check on the status of the deployment.

Confirm deployment

  1. See view applied configurations.

  2. To test connectivity between virtual networks, deploy a test virtual machine into each virtual network and start an ICMP request between them.

Next steps