LKBEN11486: What is a trunk port on a network device


Symptom

You have a problem configuring your switch/router

Cause

VLANs do not work as expected, wrong network configuration, ...

Solution

A trunk port is a specific type of port on a switch that allows data to flow across a network node for multiple VLAN's. The other type of port is an access port. A trunk is a single channel of communication that will be used by multiple entities. Because trunk port carries data for multiple entities, ist typically offers higher bandwidth and lower latency than access ports.

In contrast, an access port is a port used for one device and transmits data to and from a specific VLAN only. An access port has no tagging. A trunk port needs tagging so the other network device knows to which ports/endpoint/endpoints it has to send its communication to. Before sending the data to the endpoint/endpoints, it will remove the tag. The tag is needed to send the data from one network device to the other without loosing the VLAN information.

 

 

Disclaimer:

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About the Author

Author: Wim Peeters - Keskon GmbH & Co. KG

Wim Peeters is electronics engineer with an additional master in IT and over 30 years of experience, including time spent in support, development, consulting, training and database administration. Wim has worked with SQL Server since version 6.5. He has developed in C/C++, Java and C# on Windows and Linux. He writes knowledge base articles to solve IT problems and publishes them on the Lubby Knowledge Platform.

Latest update: 11/01/2021 | Comment: