Tutorial: Integrate a NAT gateway with an internal load balancer using the Azure portal
In this tutorial, you'll learn how to integrate a NAT gateway with an internal load balancer.
By default, an Azure Standard Load Balancer is secure. Outbound connectivity is explicitly defined by enabling outbound SNAT (Source Network Address Translation).
SNAT is enabled for an internal backend pool via another public load balancer, network routing, or a public IP defined on a virtual machine.
The NAT gateway integration replaces the need for the deployment of a public load balancer, network routing, or a public IP defined on a virtual machine in the backend pool.
In this tutorial, you learn how to:
- Create an Azure Load Balancer
- Create two virtual machines for the backend pool of the Azure Load Balancer
- Create a NAT gateway
- Validate outbound connectivity of the virtual machines in the load balancer backend pool
Prerequisites
An Azure account with an active subscription. Create an account for free.
Create the virtual network
In this section, you'll create a virtual network and subnet.
Sign in to the Azure portal.
On the upper-left side of the screen, select Create a resource > Networking > Virtual network or search for Virtual network in the search box.
Select Create.
In Create virtual network, enter or select this information in the Basics tab:
Setting Value Project Details Subscription Select your Azure subscription Resource Group Select Create new. Enter TutorIntLBNAT-rg. Select OK. Instance details Name Enter myVNet Region Select (US) East US Select the IP Addresses tab or select the Next: IP Addresses button at the bottom of the page.
In the IP Addresses tab, enter this information:
Setting Value IPv4 address space Enter 10.1.0.0/16 Under Subnet name, select the word default.
In Edit subnet, enter this information:
Setting Value Subnet name Enter myBackendSubnet Subnet address range Enter 10.1.0.0/24 Select Save.
Select the Security tab or select the Next: Security button at the bottom of the page.
Under BastionHost, select Enable. Enter this information:
Setting Value Bastion name Enter myBastionHost AzureBastionSubnet address space Enter 10.1.1.0/24 Public IP Address Select Create new. For Name, enter myBastionIP. Select OK. Select the Review + create tab or select the Review + create button.
Select Create.
Create load balancer
In this section, you create a load balancer that load balances virtual machines.
During the creation of the load balancer, you'll configure:
- Frontend IP address
- Backend pool
- Inbound load-balancing rules
In the search box at the top of the portal, enter Load balancer. Select Load balancers in the search results.
In the Load balancer page, select Create.
In the Basics tab of the Create load balancer page, enter, or select the following information:
Setting Value Project details Subscription Select your subscription. Resource group Select TutorIntLBNAT-rg. Instance details Name Enter myLoadBalancer Region Select (US) East US. SKU Leave the default Standard. Type Select Internal. Select Next: Frontend IP configuration at the bottom of the page.
In Frontend IP configuration, select + Add a frontend IP configuration.
Enter LoadBalancerFrontend in Name.
Select myVNet in Virtual network.
Select myBackendSubnet in Subnet.
Select Dynamic for Assignment.
Select Zone-redundant in Availability zone.
Note
In regions with Availability Zones, you have the option to select no-zone (default option), a specific zone, or zone-redundant. The choice will depend on your specific domain failure requirements. In regions without Availability Zones, this field won't appear. For more information on availability zones, see Availability zones overview.
Select Add.
Select Next: Backend pools at the bottom of the page.
In the Backend pools tab, select + Add a backend pool.
Enter myBackendPool for Name in Add backend pool.
Select NIC or IP Address for Backend Pool Configuration.
Select IPv4 or IPv6 for IP version.
Select Add.
Select the Next: Inbound rules button at the bottom of the page.
In Load balancing rule in the Inbound rules tab, select + Add a load balancing rule.
In Add load balancing rule, enter or select the following information:
Setting Value Name Enter myHTTPRule IP Version Select IPv4 or IPv6 depending on your requirements. Frontend IP address Select LoadBalancerFrontend. Backend pool Select myBackendPool. Protocol Select TCP. Port Enter 80. Backend port Enter 80. Health probe Select Create new. In Name, enter myHealthProbe. Select HTTP in Protocol. Leave the rest of the defaults, and select OK. Session persistence Select None. Idle timeout (minutes) Enter or select 15. TCP reset Select Enabled. Floating IP Select Disabled. Select Add.
Select the blue Review + create button at the bottom of the page.
Select Create.
Create virtual machines
In this section, you'll create two VMs (myVM1 and myVM2) in two different zones (Zone 1 and Zone 2).
These VMs are added to the backend pool of the load balancer that was created earlier.
On the upper-left side of the portal, select Create a resource > Compute > Virtual machine.
In Create a virtual machine, type or select the values in the Basics tab:
Setting Value Project Details Subscription Select your Azure subscription Resource Group Select TutorIntLBNAT-rg Instance details Virtual machine name Enter myVM1 Region Select (US) East US Availability Options Select Availability zones Availability zone Select 1 Image Select Windows Server 2019 Datacenter Azure Spot instance Leave the default Size Choose VM size or take default setting Administrator account Username Enter a username Password Enter a password Confirm password Reenter password Inbound port rules Public inbound ports Select None Select the Networking tab, or select Next: Disks, then Next: Networking.
In the Networking tab, select or enter:
Setting Value Network interface Virtual network myVNet Subnet myBackendSubnet Public IP Select None. NIC network security group Select Advanced Configure network security group Select Create new. In the Create network security group, enter myNSG in Name. Under Inbound rules, select +Add an inbound rule. Under Destination port ranges, enter 80. Under Priority, enter 100. In Name, enter myNSGRule Select Add Select OK Load balancing Place this virtual machine behind an existing load-balancing solution? Select the check box. Load balancing settings Load balancing options Select Azure load balancer Select a load balancer Select myLoadBalancer Select a backend pool Select myBackendPool Select Review + create.
Review the settings, and then select Create.
Follow the steps 1 to 6 to create a VM with the following values and all the other settings the same as myVM1:
Setting VM 2 Name myVM2 Availability zone 2 Network security group Select the existing myNSG
Create NAT gateway
In this section, you'll create a NAT gateway and assign it to the subnet in the virtual network you created previously.
On the upper-left side of the screen, select Create a resource > Networking > NAT gateway or search for NAT gateway in the search box.
Select Create.
In Create network address translation (NAT) gateway, enter or select this information in the Basics tab:
Setting Value Project Details Subscription Select your Azure subscription. Resource Group Select TutorIntLBNAT-rg. Instance details Name Enter myNATGateway Region Select (US) East US Availability Zone Select None. Idle timeout (minutes) Enter 10. Select the Outbound IP tab, or select the Next: Outbound IP button at the bottom of the page.
In the Outbound IP tab, enter or select the following information:
Setting Value Public IP addresses Select Create a new public IP address. In Name, enter myNATgatewayIP. Select OK. Select the Subnet tab, or select the Next: Subnet button at the bottom of the page.
In the Subnet tab, select myVNet in the Virtual network pull-down.
Check the box next to myBackendSubnet.
Select the Review + create tab, or select the blue Review + create button at the bottom of the page.
Select Create.
Test NAT gateway
In this section, we'll test the NAT gateway. We'll first discover the public IP of the NAT gateway. We'll then connect to the test virtual machine and verify the outbound connection through the NAT gateway.
Select Resource groups in the left-hand menu, select the TutorIntLBNAT-rg resource group, and then from the resources list, select myNATgatewayIP.
Make note of the public IP address:
Select Resource groups in the left-hand menu, select the TutorIntLBNAT-rg resource group, and then from the resources list, select myVM1.
On the Overview page, select Connect, then Bastion.
Enter the username and password entered during VM creation.
Open Internet Explorer on myVM1.
Enter https://whatsmyip.com in the address bar.
Verify the IP address displayed matches the NAT gateway address you noted in the previous step:
Clean up resources
If you're not going to continue to use this application, delete the virtual network, virtual machine, and NAT gateway with the following steps:
From the left-hand menu, select Resource groups.
Select the TutorIntLBNAT-rg resource group.
Select Delete resource group.
Enter TutorIntLBNAT-rg and select Delete.
Next steps
For more information on Azure Virtual Network NAT, see:
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