Bonding Connections on OpenWrt
OpenWrt, by default, wraps all of your wide-area networks, or WANs, into a bridge network.
This allows applications to access one of your available WANs through a uniform interface.
This behavior can be reconfigured. Some router manufacturers, such as GL.iNet, do not bridge WAN devices.
Speedify requires individually addressable networks with default routes to bond their traffic.
Most routers come with a single default WAN port. However, other ports, although they might not be labeled in this way, can also be used as WAN ports.
- If you have LAN Ethernet or serial ports, they can be reconfigured as WAN ports
- If you have USB ports, Android devices and iPhones can act as a WAN through tethering
- For tethering support, install the necessary packages follow steps 3 through 5 below in this article for the tethering device.
- For iOS, the tethering device is usually eth2, and for Android, the device is usually usb0
After you have chosen which ports you want to use as WANs, you need to configure them as standalone networks outside of a bridge.
- Remove all devices currently in your br-wan network, or a similarly named bridge network
- Remove any LAN port which you want to use as a WAN network from the LAN bridge, usually br-lan
- Navigate to Network > Interfaces and at the bottom select the Add New Interface option. Add each of the WAN networks as standalone networks
- Add each wan device to the firewall zone covering the WAN
Configure a unique gateway metric for each WAN, including any existing WANs without a gateway metric. Keep in mind that the lower the number, the more likely your router is to use the connection as a default router when Speedify is not connected.
Save and Apply the changes.
Bonding should now work on your router and you should see all the connections you set up as WAN interfaces appear in the Speedify UI.
If you also want to bond a Wi-Fi connection, please refer to this article.