Hello Mikrotik team,
I would like to request a feature that would simplify a common ISP deployment scenario and address a current limitation in RouterOS. I believe that I am presenting a common use case that will resonate with many Mikrotik users.
Forgive me for using some AI help to construct a cleaner post than what I would have done myself, since english is not my native language and my network knowledge is limited.
Use case
My ISP's locked 5G CPE has only one ethernet port that delivers the following services to my Mikrotik's WAN port (ether1):
- Untagged Ethernet: Internet access (DHCP for IPv4, SLAAC for IPv6)
- VLAN 100 (802.1Q tagged): VoIP service
I would like to:
- Keep
ether1as a standalone WAN interface. - Run the IPv4 DHCP client and IPv6 SLAAC only on
ether1. - Transparently forward VLAN 100 (still tagged) from
ether1to one or more LAN ports for a VoIP gateway. - Avoid adding
ether1to the bridge.
Why this is important for me
My ISP provides only a single IPv6 /64 via SLAAC and does not provide DHCPv6 Prefix Delegation.
If ether1 is added to a bridge, the bridge becomes the Layer 2 endpoint, and IPv6 Router Advertisements are received on the bridge instead of the physical WAN interface. This changes the WAN interface model and makes it impossible to keep native IPv6 SLAAC bound exclusively to not expose the bridge MAC in the WAN IPv6 SLAAC (using EUI-64).ether1
Current limitation
As far as I understand, RouterOS currently offers two possibilities:
- Add
ether1to a VLAN-aware bridge and use bridge VLAN filtering. - Create VLAN interfaces on
ether1, which terminates the VLAN and does not provide transparent tagged forwarding.
There appears to be no mechanism to transparently forward selected tagged Ethernet frames from a standalone physical interface into a bridge while leaving the untagged traffic attached to the physical interface.
Requested functionality
It would be very useful if RouterOS supported selective Layer 2 forwarding of specific VLANs from a standalone interface into a bridge, for example:
- Forward VLAN 100 frames arriving on
ether1tobridge1(or directly to selected bridge ports), preserving the VLAN tag. - Continue delivering untagged traffic on
ether1to the router's networking stack. - Allow IPv4 DHCP and especially IPv6 SLAAC to remain bound to the physical WAN interface.
The exact implementation is not important. It could be implemented as a bridge feature, a switch feature, or another mechanism, as long as it allows transparent forwarding of selected VLANs without requiring the physical WAN interface to become a bridge port.
Typical deployment
This would be particularly useful for ISPs that provide:
- Untagged Internet
- Tagged VoIP
- Tagged IPTV
on the same physical access port of their CPE.
Currently, the only practical workaround is to use an external managed switch to split the services before they reach the MikroTik router.
I believe this capability would make RouterOS much more flexible for several service-provider deployments while preserving the ability to keep the WAN interface independent for protocols such as IPv6 SLAAC.
Thank you for seriously considering this feature request.
EDIT:
SOLVED — Two ways to handle untagged WAN + tagged VoIP on the same port
Thanks to the valuable guidance from the forum members, I eventually realized that no new RouterOS feature is required for this setup.
There are two valid approaches. Solution A is useful when the physical WAN interface must remain outside the bridge. Solution B is the preferred approach for my RB760iGS/hEX S because the MT7621 switch chip can hardware-offload the VLAN-aware bridge.
I ultimately used Solution B.
For background on the RouterOS bridge/VLAN model:
Solution A — WAN port outside the bridge
This is a valid solution when ether1 must remain a standalone L3 WAN interface.
Create a VLAN interface on ether1 for the ISP's tagged VoIP VLAN, and add that VLAN interface to the VLAN-filtered bridge:
/interface vlan
add comment="VoIP WAN" interface=ether1 name=VoIP-WAN vlan-id=100
/interface bridge port
add bridge=bridge1 edge=yes frame-types=admit-only-untagged-and-priority-tagged interface=VoIP-WAN pvid=100
/interface bridge vlan
add bridge=bridge1 comment="VoIP VLAN" tagged=bridge1,ether2 untagged=VoIP-WAN vlan-ids=100
The VLAN interface terminates VLAN 100 on ether1 and presents it to the bridge as untagged traffic. The bridge then classifies it into VLAN 100 and forwards it tagged to ether2.
Untagged Internet traffic remains directly on ether1, so the IPv4 DHCP client and IPv6 SLAAC can remain attached to the physical WAN interface.
edge=yes is used because the ISP-facing port is not intended to participate in the local STP topology.
This was originally pointed out by lurker888 and later explicitly confirmed by MikroTik Support:
The trade-off is that the tagged service uses the VLAN-interface/CPU path rather than direct hardware switching between physical bridge ports.
Solution B — VLAN-aware bridge with the WAN port included
This is the preferred solution for the RB760iGS/MT7621.
Add the physical WAN port to the same VLAN-filtered bridge as the LAN ports. The WAN port becomes a hybrid port:
-
untagged ISP Internet → internal VLAN 1000
-
tagged ISP VoIP → VLAN 100
/interface bridge port
add bridge=bridge1 comment="WAN" edge=yes interface=ether1 pvid=1000
/interface bridge vlan
add bridge=bridge1 comment="WAN VLAN" tagged=bridge1 untagged=ether1 vlan-ids=1000
add bridge=bridge1 comment="VoIP VLAN" tagged=ether1,ether2 vlan-ids=100
edge=yes is used because ether1 is the ISP-facing port and is not intended to form an STP path to another bridge.
The WAN VLAN entry is essential: ether1 is the untagged/access member of VLAN 1000, while bridge1 is the tagged router-facing member.
The untagged Internet service is therefore represented internally as VLAN 1000. The L3 WAN endpoint is a VLAN interface on the bridge:
/interface vlan
add comment="WAN VLAN" interface=bridge1 name=WAN-VLAN vlan-id=1000
The critical RouterOS concept is that the physical WAN port and the L3 WAN interface do not have to be the same interface. The bridge performs the Layer-2 switching, while WAN-VLAN is the Layer-3 endpoint for DHCP, IPv6 SLAAC/Router Advertisements, routing, firewalling, etc.
This was the key point explained by lurker888 and CGGXANNX:
VLAN 100 does not require a VLAN interface because it is not routed by the MikroTik. It remains tagged and is transparently switched between ether1 and ether2.
MACVLAN and the WAN MAC address
The remaining issue in my particular setup was the WAN MAC identity.
My original concern with putting ether1 into the bridge was that IPv6 SLAAC using EUI-64 could expose the bridge MAC in the WAN IPv6 address. This was the main reason I initially considered it necessary to keep the physical WAN interface outside the bridge.
The solution was to create a MACVLAN on top of WAN-VLAN and use it as the L3 WAN interface:
/interface macvlan
add interface=WAN-VLAN name=WAN-MACVLAN mac-address=XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
The explicit MAC address can also be omitted:
/interface macvlan
add interface=WAN-VLAN name=WAN-MACVLAN
The DHCP client, IPv6 SLAAC/Router Advertisements, WAN interface-list membership, etc. are then applied to WAN-MACVLAN instead of WAN-VLAN.
If WAN-VLAN or WAN-MACVLAN is used as the WAN interface, it should also replace ether1 in the RouterOS WAN interface list. This is important because firewall rules, NAT rules, and other configuration that reference the WAN interface list will then apply to the new L3 WAN endpoint rather than to the physical ether1 port.
For example, when using WAN-MACVLAN:
/interface list member
add interface=WAN-MACVLAN list=WAN
Existing firewall/NAT rules that use in-interface-list=WAN or out-interface-list=WAN will then continue to follow the actual L3 WAN interface without requiring every rule to be rewritten.
This provides a separate MAC identity for the L3 WAN endpoint while keeping the physical WAN port inside the VLAN-aware bridge.
CGGXANNX specifically described this approach when a separate WAN MAC is required:
A related example of the same single-bridge WAN/VLAN architecture is:
https://forum.mikrotik.com/t/raw-vlan-forwarding-between-wan-and-lan
That discussion also explains why a second bridge loses L2 hardware offloading, whereas keeping the relevant physical ports in one VLAN-filtered bridge allows the switch chip to perform the VLAN tagging/untagging and intra-VLAN forwarding.
Result
For this RB760iGS/MT7621 setup:
Solution A remains a valid option when the physical WAN interface must stay outside the bridge. It keeps ether1 as the L3 WAN interface, while a VLAN interface on ether1 provides the bridge path for the tagged VoIP VLAN.
Solution B is the preferred architecture when there is no such requirement. It allows the WAN port to participate in the VLAN-aware bridge and keeps the tagged VoIP traffic in the hardware-switched L2 path.
I ultimately used Solution B. The original assumption that the physical WAN interface also had to remain the L3 WAN endpoint was the key misunderstanding. Once the L3 endpoint was moved to WAN-VLAN, and a WAN-MACVLAN was used to provide a separate MAC identity, there was no longer a reason to keep the physical WAN port outside the bridge.
No new RouterOS feature is required for this particular deployment.