BGP-VPLS (l2vpn-cisco) stops working after upgrade from 7.19.6 to 7.20.6 — L2VPN NLRI not received,

RouterOS Forwarding Protocols
1

After upgrading a CCR2004 from RouterOS 7.19.6 to 7.20.6, BGP-VPLS (BGP L2VPN / l2vpn-cisco) stops working completely.
The BGP sessions come up, but the router no longer receives any l2vpn-cisco NLRI from the RR. As a result, VPLS instances do not establish and no L2 traffic passes.

On 7.19.6 everything works normally.

Symptoms on 7.20.6:

  • BGP sessions (iBGP) are Established.

  • PrefixCount = 0 in the session sometimes, even though IPv4 prefixes appear in RIB.

  • No L2VPN NLRI is installed, Dynamic VPLS interfaces not created.

  • Downgrading back to 7.19.6 immediately restores correct operation.

Configuration excerpt (works on 7.19.6):

/routing/bgp/export compact

2025-12-12 10:07:33 by RouterOS 7.19.6

software id = S7J1-YLF8

model = CCR2004-1G-12S+2XS

/routing bgp template
add afi=ip,l2vpn-cisco as=6879 cisco-vpls-nlri-len-fmt=auto-bytes comment=def disabled=no input.filter=RR-in multihop=yes name=def output.filter-chain=RR-out .network=\
"" .redistribute=connected,bgp-mpls-vpn routing-table=main
/routing bgp connection
add afi=ip,l2vpn-cisco cisco-vpls-nlri-len-fmt=auto-bytes connect=yes disabled=no input.filter=RR-in listen=yes local.address=172.20.200.12 .role=ibgp .ttl=20 \
multihop=yes name=bgp2 output.default-originate=never .filter-chain=RR-out .keep-sent-attributes=yes .network="" .redistribute=connected,bgp-mpls-vpn \
remote.address=172.20.222.0/32 .as=6879 .port=179 routing-table=main templates=def
add afi=ip,l2vpn-cisco cisco-vpls-nlri-len-fmt=auto-bytes connect=yes disabled=no input.filter=RR-in keepalive-time=1s listen=yes local.address=172.20.200.12 .role=\
ibgp .ttl=20 multihop=yes name=bgp1 output.default-originate=never .filter-chain=RR-out .keep-sent-attributes=yes .network="" .redistribute=connected,bgp-mpls-vpn \
remote.address=172.20.222.255/32 .as=6879 .port=179 routing-table=main templates=def
/routing bgp vpls
add bridge=v3112 bridge-cost=50 bridge-horizon=1 cisco-id=172.20.200.12&6879:3112 disabled=no export-route-targets=6879:3112 import-route-targets=6879:3112 name=v3112 \
pw-control-word=disabled pw-l2mtu=1552 pw-type=raw-ethernet rd=6879:3112 vrf=main
add bridge=v69 bridge-horizon=1 cisco-id=172.20.200.12&6879:69 disabled=no export-route-targets=6879:69 import-route-targets=6879:69 name=v69 pw-control-word=disabled \
pw-l2mtu=1552 pw-type=raw-ethernet rd=6879:69 vrf=main

Re-creating BGP sessions does not help.

Can someone confirm whether 7.20.6 breaks L2VPN-Cisco NLRI?

Is there an internal change or new option required for BGP-VPLS that is not documented?

2

same setup here, haven't upgraded yet.
Thanks for the heads up!

3

Indeed, BGP VPLS does not work from ROS 7.20 onwards. This was confirmed by Support, who responded that "cisco style VPLS currently does not work properly. We will try to fix this until next ROS release."

4

To be realistic whole BGP MPLS staff completely broken . We wonder do they really do some testing before release . MPLS VPN4 broken (bgp send random label In MP_REACH_NLRI and not care about forwarding table) . BGP cluster on reflectors broken (instead of cluster ID in update is send random digit on 1st octet). IT means that BGP from mikrotik can work only with mikrotik.

5

From which version is VPNv4 broken? We are using it without any apparent problems on 7.19.

6

The problem is found in firmware 7.20.x, so update carefully.

7

From 7.20.x . After we started to update CPEs to 7.20.x stability of network degraded. We forced now periodically restart routers to fix mpls vpn4 . IF you have hundreds of routers in MPLS network prepare to restart every day one or another router to fix VPN4 .