Connect VMs Together from VMWare Workstation & Hypwe-V Running in Same Host

In my lab environment, I am havng a Windows host which enabled Hyper-V, also installed VMWare workstation Pro. It was very confusion for me when I tried to put both Hyper-V machines and VMWare machines into same network, since the network names are quite different in Windows Hosts, VMWare and Hyper-V.

In this post, I am going to record all network names in three different places:

Windows Host Network Connections
VMware workstation Virtual Network Editor environment
Hyper-V Virtual Switch Manager

I am also going to show you a correct way if you want to connect both Hyper-V machines and VMware workstation machines into same network.

Physical Interfaces

In my host machine, there are six Physical NICs. This is a screenshot from Windows Host's Device Manager for those six physical NICs:

Actually there are more NICs from host's Device Manager, other than those six physical ones:

VMWare Workstation's Virtual Network Editor

From VMWare workstation's virtual network editor's configuration, we can choose a bridged VMnet, External - Virtual Switch (vEthernet (External) in Windows's network connections) to take a look:

External network - Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection - 192.168.2.245

All those available networks are shows in our host's device manager. But you will find one strange thing, there is no "Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection", which is using 192.168.2.x ip address behind my home Internet router.

The reason is because "Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection" has been taken by Hyper-V switch. If you want to get VMWare workstation bridge to "Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection", you will have to brige to a network created by Hyper-v which is "Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter".

Basically, from VMWare workstation, you can't directly bridge to a network device which has been bridged in Hyper-V virtual switch.

Hyper-V Virtual Switch Manager

Now, lets take a look Hyper-V environment. When you open your Hyper-V's virtual switch manager, you will see some familiar network devices, but ended with different number.

You will see External virtual network switch has been bridged to "Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection"

Control Panel - Network and Sharing Center

Ethernet = QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #63

Ethernet 2 = QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #62

Ethernet 3 = QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #64

Ethernet 4 = QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #65

Ethernet 5 = Intel(R) 82574L Gigabit Network Connection

Ethernet 6 = Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection - 192.168.2.245

vEthernet (Default Switch) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #2 - 172.17.128.1

vEthernet (Ethernet 2) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #4 - 192.168.160.1

vEthernet (Ethernet 3) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #5 - 172.31.96.1

vEthernet (Ethernet 4) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #6 - 172.27.80.1

vEthernet (Ethernet 5) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #7 - 172.22.176.1

vEthernet (Ethernet 6) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #8 - 172.28.112.1

vEthernet (Ethernet) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #3 - 172.20.80.1

vEthernet (External) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter ( which was created when I bridged External virtual switch to Intel(R) 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection)

vEthernet (vEthernet (Exte) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #8 - 172.17.144.1

------------------------LAN4 network was created later for testing from Hyper-V environment -------------

vEthernet (LAN4) = Hyper-V virtual Etherent Adapter (which was created when I bridged LAN4 switch to QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #4)

vEthernet (vEthernet (LAN4) = Hyper-V Virtual Ethernet Adapter #9 - 172.31.48.1

VMWare Workstation Create A New vNet

VMnet2 - Bridged - QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #64 , which is Ethernet 3.

Hyper-V

To map to same network as we did on VMWare Workstation, we will use QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #3, which is same as VMWare world's "QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #64".

Once you did Hyper-V network new virtual switch configuration to bridge #3 switch, the VMWare VMnet2's bridge configuration will disappear, since that "QLogic BCM5709C Gigabit Ethernet (NDIS VBD Client) #64" has been used by Hyper-V.