OpenWrt 23.05.4, Linksys E7350, trying to set up a guest network. I'm new to all this, and using the web interface. I can manage command line, but the instructions don't explain what's being done so I'm hesitant to just type commands. I followed the instructions here: https://openwrt.org/docs/guide-user/network/wifi/guestwifi/configuration_webinterface (Guest Wi-Fi using LuCI) as best I could, given that this is for an older version. I configured it to the 2.4 GHz band and ignored IPv6. I thought I did it all correctly - it all made sense - but something's not right. All guest connections are in the 192.168.1.x range, instead of 192.168.3.x.
I can't share my configurations because I tried changing this and that to get it to work and ended up borking the router so badly that I was lucky to get reconnected, and I performed a reset. So I'm back to Square One, and I could use some help. A guest network on the standard LAN is pointless. There has to be a way to get DHCP to deliver different addresses to the two networks, what am I missing?
Although the guide has screenshots from earlier OpenWrt versions, it should largely be valid. It is the guide I point to whenever people ask about configuring a guest network.
With that said, the fact that you're starting from a near-default state is probably good. I would recommend just going through the process again. At the moment, I'm having trouble loading the guest wifi wiki article to look it over, but I would recommend that you go through this process:
create a new bridge -- call it br-guest -- with nothing in it and select the option to create an empty bridge.
create a new network interface called guest with static IP address 192.168.3.1 and subnet mask 255.255.255.0. Link that with br-guest
create a DHCP server for the new guest network
create a new firewall zone for the guest network. Initially, set the zone policies for input, output, and forward to ACCEPT.
Allow forwarding from guest > wan
Finally, create a new guest SSID on one or both bands and link it against the network guest.
That should be all that is required. If you run into issues or have questions along the way, post your configs in whatever state they're in and we can review/advise.
Please connect to your OpenWrt device using ssh and copy the output of the following commands and post it here using the "Preformatted text </> " button:
Remember to redact passwords, MAC addresses and any public IP addresses you may have:
Ah-ha! I re-used the existing bridge. I'm sure that's my problem. I didn't know could create a new one. Thank you for your help, I'll try again and report back. Unfortunately I can only do this when everyone else in the house is offline so it will have to wait until tomorrow morning. Last night I disconnected everyone in the middle of a Netflix video and my wife and daughter were not pleased.
You should actually be able to do this with minimal interruptions... should be literally a few instances of a few seconds each of downtime as the network and firewall services restart.
Yes, that was certainly the problem. If you want to have Ethernet connectivity for the guest network (in addition to the wifi; useful if you have additional access points or any other need for guests to use Ethernet), then we do actually need to do some special stuff with br-lan -- specifically we'd use bridge VLANs. But if your guest network is wifi only and only broadcasting from this specific device, you can create br-guest and be done.
so it will have to wait until tomorrow morning. Last night I disconnected everyone in the middle of a Netflix video and my wife and daughter were not pleased.