diff --git a/drivers/net/vxlan.c b/drivers/net/vxlan.c
index 032f78261913d..977f77e2c2ce6 100644
--- a/drivers/net/vxlan.c
+++ b/drivers/net/vxlan.c
@@ -3880,8 +3880,10 @@ static int __vxlan_dev_create(struct net *net, struct net_device *dev,
 
 	if (dst->remote_ifindex) {
 		remote_dev = __dev_get_by_index(net, dst->remote_ifindex);
-		if (!remote_dev)
+		if (!remote_dev) {
+			err = -ENODEV;
 			goto errout;
+		}
 
 		err = netdev_upper_dev_link(remote_dev, dev, extack);
 		if (err)