VE route-only mode

By default, physical ports and port-channels (LAG ports) support both Layer 2 switching and Layer 3 routing. VE route-only mode enables these ports to act exclusively as a Layer 3 virtual Ethernet (VE) interface, dropping all ingress packets that require Layer 2 switching.

The MAC learning of dropped packets is not affected by this feature. ARP requests (broadcast), LACP, and BPDU packet processing are also not affected. The following table lists the effects of this mode on a variety of features.
Table 1. Effects of VE route-only mode on features
Feature Ingress port as route-only port (incoming frames) Egress port as route-only port (outgoing frames)
Packets requiring switching Drop, learn MAC address Forwarded/switched
Packets requiring routing Forwarded Forwarded
ARP requests Trapped/punted, ARP response generated Forwarded
LACP packets Trapped/punted and processed Forwarded
STP/BPDU packets Trapped/punted and processed Forwarded

Note the following considerations and limitations: