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# VLANS and VLAN Groups

Each VLAN may be assigned to a location, tenant, and/or VLAN group.

Each VLAN must be assigned a status. The following statuses are available by default:

- Active
- Reserved
- Deprecated

In general, VLANs can have overlapping names and IDs. The exception to this is VLANs within a VLAN Group: each VLAN within a group must have a unique ID and name.
A VLAN Group may be assigned to a specific location, but a Group cannot belong to multiple locations. VLANs may be assigned to a specific location as well.

The Nautobot documentation has more info about VLANs and VLAN Groups.

## VLAN Example

The following example will show:

- Creating a `vlan 200` without a location assignment (global scope)
- Creating two VLANs, each with overlapping Names and IDs: ID = `100` and Name = `vlan 100`
  - Neither of the `vlan 100` instances will be assigned to a group, but each of the VLANs will be assigned to a different location (location-specific scope)
- How the location-specific and global scopes affect which VLANs can be assigned on which Devices

Note

This example will require a Location (`Ottawa 1`) within a Parent Location (`Ottawa`) in the `North America` Parent Location in addition to the `Vancouver 1` Location and `Vancouver` Parent Location created prior. Refer back to the Create a Location sections to do so.

### Creating the VLANs

1. Click on IPAM in the left sidebar menu
2. Look for the VLANS option and click on the + to go to the `Add a new VLAN` form
3. Populate `ID` with `200`
4. Populate `Name` with `vlan 200`
5. Select `Status` as `Active`
6. Click on `Create and Add Another` to save; you will then be taken to the `Add a new VLAN` form

Note

The required parameters to create a new VLAN are bolded in the `Add a new VLAN` form: ID, Name, and Status

Now we'll create two instances of VLANs, each with ID = `100` and Name = `vlan 100` and an `Active` Status. The differentiator will be that one instance will be assigned to the `Vancouver 1` Site and the other to the `Ottawa 1` Site.

On the `Add a new VLAN` form:

1. Populate `ID` with `100`
2. Populate `Name` with `vlan 100`
3. Select `Status` as `Active`
4. Select `ANG01` from the `Location` selector drop-down
5. Click on the `Create and Add Another` button

On the `Add a new VLAN` form:

1. Populate `ID` with `100`
2. Populate `Name` with `vlan 100`
3. Select `Status` as `Active`
4. Select `BRE01` from the `Location` selector drop-down
5. Click on the `Create` button when complete with the second instance

Once you've created the three VLANs and then hit the `Create` button, you will be taken to the VLANs main page. On that page, you'll see the three VLANs and the Location assignment for each one. Each `vlan 100` instance will have a Location assignment, while `vlan 200` will not:

### Assigning VLANs to an Interface

To assign a VLAN to an Interface:

1. Select Devices to go to the Devices main page
2. Click on the name of the Device you wish to add a VLAN to (`ang01-edge-01`) in this example
3. Click on the `Edit` button for the `xe-0/0/0` Interface to go to the `Editing interface xe-0/0/0` page
4. On the `Editing interface xe-0/0/0` page, set `802.1Q` Mode to `Access` (or whatever mode you need) and then click on the VLAN drop-down selector. Notice that there are two choices:
   - One choice is the `vlan 100` instance specifically assigned to the `ANG01` Location
   - The other choice is `vlan 200`, which was not assigned to a Location, and thus has a global scope

Note

The `vlan 100` instance that is assigned to the `BRE01` Location does not show up as an option for the `ANG01` Location