VMs unable to ping when on Distributed vSwitch (vDS)

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

When VMs are migrated to a Host and using a Distributed switch, the VMs are unable to ping their default gateway, a VM on another Host, nor are they able to ping a VM on the same Host using the same portgroup/network.

It will also likely be seen on the vDS Summary tab either or both of these two messages:

"An Upgrade for the vSphere Distributed switch in datacenter is in progress" 
"The vSphere Distributed Switch configuration on some hosts differed from that of VMware vCenter"

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 7.x
VMware vCenter Server 8.x

Cause

The vDS has been upgraded from 6.7 but the ESXi Host proxy copy of the vDS has not been upgraded successfully, causing the Host to be out of sync with the master vDS copy.

To verify, from the affected Host console check below steps.

*** "net-dvs -l | head -1" shows "etherswitch" instead of what should be seen "cswitch", for example:

switch bf 3a 26 50 fb 61 ab a8-d3 9e d9 5d 89 ac 1c 8c (etherswitch) 

*** "net-dvs -l | egrep "port |vlan "

        port 5457:
                com.vmware.common.port.volatile.vlan = VLAN 0
                com.vmware.etherswitch.port.vlan = Guest VLAN tagging
                        load balancing = source virtual port id
         port c-8352:
                com.vmware.common.port.volatile.vlan = VLAN 0
                        load balancing = source virtual port id
                com.vmware.etherswitch.port.vlan = VLAN 36
        port 5976:
                com.vmware.common.port.volatile.vlan = VLAN 34
                com.vmware.etherswitch.port.vlan = VLAN 34
                        load balancing = source virtual port id
        port 3873:
                com.vmware.common.port.volatile.vlan = VLAN 0
                com.vmware.etherswitch.port.vlan = VLAN 36
                        load balancing = source virtual port id
        port 4833:
                com.vmware.common.port.volatile.vlan = VLAN 0
                com.vmware.etherswitch.port.vlan = No VLAN

Notice the mismatches in bold above, these values should match.

Resolution

 

Reboot the ESXi host or address the Host out of sync issue by manually removing the Host from the vDS and adding it back.  This will update the Host's local proxy copy of the vDS so it then matches the master vDS in the vCenter database.

 

For additional information on the steps involved, see KB:  The vSphere Distributed Switch configuration on some hosts differed from that of VMware vCenter- "Out of Sync"