macOS Big Sur - VMware Fusion 12 not working anymore when host is connected to VPN

[snataniel]

Hello,

I've updated my macOS from Catalina to Big Sur and since then i also had to upgrade from the VMware fusion 11 to VMware fusion 12.

I've been using expressVPN for couple of months and usually i connect the host machine to the VPN and then i'm also able to have my guest machines under the VPN, but it's happening that now every time i connect to the VPN the guest machines simply can't access the network anymore. Any idea how to solve this issue?

Vmware machines network configurations:

• I've tried my network adapter using the default configuration (Share with my MAC - NAT)
• I've also tried with custom vmnet

[VPNGUY]

I am getting bridge100 as well for my Windows 7 virtual machine. I followed all the steps and got stuck on step three when I had to find utunY. Turns out my vm is on bridge100 and not utun even when I select NAT. I am assuming if everything was working correctly I would get something like utun5 and the ip address 192.168.0.1/25 and the default gateway as well. I don't get any of that. I turned off networking and checked and the bridge100 was gone which indicates to me that NAT is fully broken. If you could post some screenshots of the process that would be amazing as I might be making a mistake of some sort.

[Fritze02]

While I have no solution to it, I can explain, why this is happening 🙂

When you connect your VPN, many configurations (and most corporate ones) don't allow split tunneling. In other words, once you connect your VPN, all your traffic is routed through that new connection. Your VPN software creates a virtual network adaptor for that, called utunX. However, your VMs are not aware of this change, and your Mac as a host doesn't know, where to pass on the packages that come in from the VMs, so they end up in Nirvana. 

If (as it should be) you are using NAT on your VM network settings, there should simply be another utunY device and you can "teach" your Mac to also NAT that behind the VPN. However, this doesn't work for network bridges, which for some reason also pop up now, even when you are selecting "NAT" for the VM.

I tried to simplify this a little. It is more complicated, as bridging is a layer 2 function, routing and NAT is layer 3, etc. 

Users should never ever have to poke around those settings, it should just work! VMWare should be aware of the issue and resolve it once and for all by pushing a patch. As it is now, we can't even tell them because support is non existent for Fusion and I am certainly not going to pay an additional 50 USD just to file a bug report.

Use VirtualBox instead. Costs nothing and works like a charm.

[variable1]

Definitely not the right answer, but I actually wound up installing the VPN client on the guests.

There is no excuse for this, but that's how I worked around it.

[vpert]

Hi there,
same issue with when having a virtual adapter configured with tagged VLAN (1) on Big Sure 11.1 and Fusion 12.1.0.
The VM is connected (Bridged) with the virtual Adapter.

Certain function work, the VM get's a DHCP network address from the DHCP Server in the VLAN 1 for example.
But no network communication like ping, connect network share and so forth afterwards. 

Capturing packets show that the VM is communicating out of the virtual adapter and the target system is also sending replies but the reply is "disappearing" between the virtual Adapter on BigSure and VMware Fusion.

Tom

[thebtaylor]

Don't worry about paying for support.  They're useless.  They reply with a canned response of "You should work with Cisco and Apple to resolve the problem"

[VPNGUY]

I am on Twitter and the only person from the Fusion team who seems to be active in terms of answering questions is @Mikero. Perhaps he can shed some light on this topic as it's starting to get frustrating. My company pays for VMware Fusion Pro and this type of stuff should simply work.

Is the Fusion team aware of this issue? Are there any patches coming in soon for this issue? If not is there anyway the team can release a 12.1.1 version with the fixes for this issue? Seems to me like it should be quite simple to fix.

Not trying to put anyone under the spotlight, I just wish this small issue can be resolved so that I can get back to work. It worked before and now it doesn't all of a sudden. Perhaps this is a 12.1 issue? 12.0 seemed fine to me and I would be happy to roll back to it if a copy of it is stored somewhere on the VMware site.

[ggilliam]

Fusion team is aware.

I just setup the VPN on my guest machines now since they can’t share from MacOS/Fusion right now.

[iljw4fo8slskdjf]

FYI, this issue also seems to affect physical NICs, not just VPN.

My situation is a MacBook Pro running BS 11.2 with Fusion Pro 12.1.  The Mac wifi has internet access and all the VMs have internet access without issues.  I have multiple different USB NICs that I use to connect to small local networks.  The Mac can ping devices on the network no problem but the VM cannot ping the devices.  No VPN involved here.

This used to work fine - not entirely sure when it stopped working.

The only workaround is to bridge the adapter to the VM or connect the USB NIC directly to the VM.

[tomeq82]

Problem is deeper. Basically, no traffic is working for Fusion 12 and Big Sur, all latest when it is http/https. Or, it works only for very short time after guest booting - like 30 seconds. Just try it. It doesn't matter if I use NAT or bridged, NAT is not working at all, while bridged gives some IP access - ping, dns, ssh, works. HTTP/HTTPS doesn't or works partially, dropping "ssl protocol error". Operating system doesn't matter too - Linux and Windows 10 are same prone to this.

Establishing VPN from inside guest to outside world yeld more or less the same behavior, but you can access http/https pages that are explictly routed via VPN - so if something is reachable via VPN you'll be able to access it via http/https. If it is not, no chance. 

What is suprisingly funny that all 445/tcp over bridged connection eg. to local NAS works like a charm 😄 

I would say, someone screwed something very very heavily. Sending us users to Cisco or Apple is pathetic move.

[adixb]

I think I'm to this point. I put off updating to Big Sur and to Fusion 12 because this is not the first time VMWare has screwed up my dev environment.

I updated an old dev machine first and it seemed to be working, so I updated my main dev rig. Sill me.

Shame on you VMWare. Why do I pay for substandard software? VirtualBox it is.

[MrShield]

Any news regarding this?

I've tried everything, but I still have no Internet access at all via NAT or Bridge.

I can't understand how this still can be an issue, it's been months now!

[thebtaylor]

We upgraded to parallels.  VMware is content with blaming Apple and VPN vendors even though the vendor (cisco in my case) has already updated to a compatible client.  If they really cared they'd release an update with a compatibility mode to use the legacy networking method until this is solved but I guess once they have your money they wont care until its time for renewal.

[iljw4fo8slskdjf]

Still no resolution.

My workaround has been a USB NIC that the VM can take exclusive hardware access.  This is not viable for multiple simultaneous guests but does work for now.  No idea why VMWare has not addressed this issue.

[firstim]

I found a workaround solution see if works for you:

https://communities.vmware.com/t5/VMware-Fusion-Discussions/macOS-Big-Sur-VMware-Fusion-12-not-worki...

[Just360]

Am I missing something? Its month since this issue has surfaced, but no proper solution?

Only one which worked for me is disabling VPN on host machine and setting it up on virtual machine. It is also unsustainable.

I am new to VMWare, wanted to test it out and find lots of benefits, but this VPN issue just stopps me from using it.

I am not paid customer, so I can't be "unhappy" reasonably really, just sharing my experience of testing VMWare out.

[vpert]

I finally solved this:

uninstall VMware Fushion

install Parallels Desktop

sorry for not providing a other solution; but Parallels was able to bring up a solution for Apple having changing their network stack.

[lanceasbury9924]

VMWare fusion has been broken since Big Sur came out. No response from VMWare. I recommend trying VirtualBox or Parallels. The proposed fix in the other thread does not work either.

As mentioned, this doesn't just affected VPN but even non-VPN connections. Bridged and NAT are broken, meaning no networking for VMWare Fusion. Still waiting for a response from VMWare

[thebtaylor]

This would be like them changing the asphalt on the roads and urging car manufacturers to change the tires they use.  Ford changed the tires and now they can't drive on the interstate.  Ford claims that it is a problem with the wheel manufacturer and the owners should contact them.  Chevy is still using the old tires and their vehicles aren't having any problems.

While Ford's claim that it is the wheel manufacturer's issue may be 100% true, we still need to drive on the interstate.  Instead of providing customers access to the old wheels they have a hardline stance that they are not going to do any work and it is on the customer to find a solution with the wheel manufacturers.

We solved the issue by purchasing Chevys to replace the Fords that were having the issue.  We are now looking to replace ALL of our fleet of Fords with Chevys.

Hey VMware, does this analogy make the problem a bit easier to understand?

For everyone else the current 100% working solution to this problem is uninstall VMware and install Parallels, Virtualbox, or any of the other desktop virtualization.

[spellanser]

Same problem. 

It's really sucks that's there is no workaround for now.

[kwiatk]

@VMware - when is this problem going to be fixed? It has been 6 months now and still not even an official workaround was offered. I have already tested the same VM on Parallels and it works fine - no VPN issues. If there is no fix/workaround offered soon, me and my colleagues will have to switch to Parallels.