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PROFESSIONAL-CLOUD-NETWORK-ENGINEER · Question #159

PROFESSIONAL-CLOUD-NETWORK-ENGINEER Question #159: Real Exam Question with Answer & Explanation

The correct answer is B: /22. In a VPC-native GKE cluster with default Pod IP range allocation, each node is assigned a /24 block of Pod IP addresses (256 addresses per node). For a cluster that can scale to a maximum of 3 nodes, you need to accommodate 3 × /24 blocks, which requires a minimum of 768 IP addre

Submitted by rachelw· Apr 18, 2026Designing, planning, and prototyping a Google Cloud network

Question

You need to define an address plan for a future new Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) cluster in your Virtual Private Cloud (VPC). This will be a VPC-native cluster, and the default Pod IP range allocation will be used. You must pre-provision all the needed VPC subnets and their respective IP address ranges before cluster creation. The cluster will initially have a single node, but it will be scaled to a maximum of three nodes if necessary. You want to allocate the minimum number of Pod IP addresses. Which subnet mask should you use for the Pod IP address range?

Options

  • A/21
  • B/22
  • C/23
  • D/25

Explanation

In a VPC-native GKE cluster with default Pod IP range allocation, each node is assigned a /24 block of Pod IP addresses (256 addresses per node). For a cluster that can scale to a maximum of 3 nodes, you need to accommodate 3 × /24 blocks, which requires a minimum of 768 IP addresses. A /23 subnet provides only 512 addresses (2 × /24 blocks), which is insufficient for 3 nodes. A /22 subnet provides 1024 addresses (4 × /24 blocks), which is the smallest CIDR that can hold 3 complete /24 node blocks - making it the minimum viable allocation. A /21 (2048) or /25 (128) would be either oversized or insufficient, respectively.

Topics

#GKE networking#VPC-native clusters#IP address planning#Subnetting

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