Workstation fails to bridge adapter with the error: Cannot change network to bridged: There are no un-bridged host network adapters

Products

• VMware Desktop Hypervisor

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• Cannot configure a second virtual network as bridged, even though there are free physical adapters available on the system
• You see the error:
  
  Cannot change network to bridged: There are no un-bridged host network adapters

Environment

VMware Workstation Pro 12.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 6.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Linux)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 8.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 7.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 8.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 11.x (for Windows)
VMware Workstation 7.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Windows)
VMware Workstation 6.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Pro 12.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 11.x (for Linux)

Cause

This issue occurs when auto bridging is enabled in the virtual network editor.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, bridge your machine to a specific physical network adapter.

To bridge your virtual machine to a specific physical network adapter:

1. Disable auto bridging before selecting the physical adapter required in the virtual network editor. For more information on changing the bridged settings, see the Change VMnet0 Bridged Networking Settings section in the Installing and Using Workstation Player

When VMnet0 has been bridged to a specific physical adapter, you can then create a second virtual adapter and bridge it to a second physical adapter:

1. In the Virtual Network Editor, click Add Network.
2. From the dropdown, select the VMnet adapter you want to use.
3. Select the newly created VMnet adapter in the display field, then select Bridged.
4. From the dropdown menu, select the physical network adapter you want to bridge to.
5. Click OK.
6. Adjust the virtual machine network settings to use the bridged adapter. For more information on changing the virtual machine network adapter, see the Modify an Existing Virtual Network Adapter for a Virtual Machine section in the Using VMware Workstation Player for Linux