Windows Server 2016 — Persistent static route disappears after reboot — Fix & Prevention

📖 ~1 min read

Table of contents

1. Symptom & Impact
2. Environment & Reproduction
3. Root Cause Analysis
4. Quick Triage
5. Step-by-Step Diagnosis
6. Solution — Primary Fix
7. Solution — Alternative Approaches
8. Verification & Acceptance Criteria
9. Rollback Plan
10. Prevention & Hardening
11. Related Errors & Cross-Refs
12. References & Further Reading

Symptom & Impact

Traffic to remote subnets fails after reboot because static route entry is gone.

Environment & Reproduction

Routes added with non-persistent flags or interface index changes.

route print
Get-NetRoute -AddressFamily IPv4

Root Cause Analysis

Route was created as active-only entry or tied to stale interface index.

Quick Triage

Identify destination route and current interface mapping.

Get-NetIPInterface
route print 10.*

Step-by-Step Diagnosis

Compare persistent store routes with active routes.

Get-NetRoute -PolicyStore PersistentStore
Get-NetRoute -PolicyStore ActiveStore

Solution — Primary Fix

Recreate route in persistent store with correct interface alias.

New-NetRoute -DestinationPrefix 10.50.0.0/16 -InterfaceAlias Ethernet -NextHop 10.0.0.254 -PolicyStore PersistentStore

Solution — Alternative Approaches

Use classic route command with persistent flag for legacy scripts.

route -p add 10.50.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0 10.0.0.254

Verification & Acceptance Criteria

Route remains after reboot and target subnet is reachable.

shutdown /r /t 0
route print 10.50

Rollback Plan

Remove incorrect persistent routes if they cause asymmetric paths.

Remove-NetRoute -DestinationPrefix 10.50.0.0/16 -Confirm:$false

Prevention & Hardening

Track route baselines in configuration management and validate after NIC changes.

Get-NetRoute -PolicyStore PersistentStore | Export-Csv C:Temproutes.csv -NoTypeInformation

Related Errors & Cross-Refs

Related to gateway metric conflicts and multi-homed host routing issues.

Related tutorial: View the step-by-step tutorial for Windows Server 2016.

View all Windows Server 2016 tutorials on the Tutorials Hub →

Browse all common problems & solutions on the Tutorials Hub.

References & Further Reading

Microsoft route management documentation for persistent networking configuration.