Does the order of entries in the routing table matter?

Does the routing order matter:

> route -n
Kernel IP routing table
Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Iface
123.x.x.151 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 vmbr0
123.x.x.154 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 vmbr0
123.x.x.128 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.224 U 0 0 0 vmbr0
192.168.1.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 vmbr1
0.0.0.0 123.x.x.129 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 vmbr0

is it the same as:

> route -n
Kernel IP routing table
Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Iface
123.x.x.128 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.224 U 0 0 0 vmbr0
123.x.x.151 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 vmbr0
123.x.x.154 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 vmbr0
192.168.1.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 vmbr1
0.0.0.0 123.x.x.129 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 vmbr0

?

where the difference is, that

123.x.x.128 123.x.x.129 255.255.255.224 U 0 0 0 vmbr0

is higher order than

123.x.x.151 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 vmbr0

so if I send to 123.x.x.151 where will it go:

- the routed way over `123.x.x.129`, because it matches the `123.x.x.128` rule, or
- the direct way using the arp table, because it matches the `123.x.x.151` rule

?

2 Answers

The order in the table doesn't matter; routes with a longer prefix always take priority. If you stop clinging to netmasks and consider the prefix lengths instead (which ip route shows), you have 123.x.x.128/27 and 123.x.x.151/32, and the latter – more specific – route will take priority over the former (more generic one).

Order only matters if you have duplicate routes. Don't do that.

For example, if two interfaces have the same destination, netmask, and gateway of 0.0.0.0, the first one will grab all the traffic for that network.

What's more, I've found some systems will randomly reorder on boot which one comes first. If only one works, or only one has a router gateway set, this can result in losing access to that network on reboot.