What are the ports of a router and how can I open them correctly? step by step guide

Although it is true, many of the connection problems that are obtained when using a certain application on the network, are associated with router ports. Since, although many are open, many others remain closed for security reasons.

In this sense, in order for any software or application to communicate over the Internet, it will be necessary to open one or more ports to send and receive data.

Therefore, it is necessary to know everything regarding the fact of opening these ports correctly, what they are and the steps to follow to do so.

What are the ports of a router and why do they need to be opened?

Basically, the ports of a router consist of the “virtual doors” or interfaces used by any computer connected to a network, to facilitate the input and output of data in a satisfactory way. In this sense, they function as a kind of door that you can start or close in order to allow the passage of information that is transferred between a network and a computer.

For its part, to understand a little the need to open these ports, it is worth explaining that when you connect to the Internet, all the applications you use redirect their traffic through these interfaces and while some, by default, are open; the truth is that most of them are closed by security hot springs.

In this sense, to allow some applications or games that are not usual to connect to the network without any problem, it is required to open the ports of a router. Which, in short, will be the same as telling said router that all the traffic that arrives through them is automatically forwarded to the IP of the computer that is requesting the information in question.

What are all the ports of a WiFi router and what is each one for?

Now, it is also important to know what all the ports of a router are and of course, what functions do they perform around meeting the needs of Internet users.

But, to begin with, we note that There are technically two typesfrom which a large number of specific WiFi router ports derive.

These are the TCP and UTP ports that we define below:

• TCP ports: This is the acronym “Transmission Control Protocol” which means “Transmission Control Protocol” and it is a record that provides remarkable flexibility regarding host to host connections. As well as simultaneous data transmission in both directions, error checking and security. Which have a main objective that is based on preventing the upper layers or applications from performing tasks, thus freeing the system from so much load.
• The UPD ports: These are used by the TCP protocol and are defined as a simple data transmission protocol that does not add checks and therefore, these must be executed by the same applications. However, even so, it is very fast.

Having bounded the above, let’s start the lists with each of the existing portsclassified according to their category and indicating what type of technical port they belong to:

Active Worlds

hotlineserver

Messenger (Microsoft)

AIM Talk

Delta Three Pc to Phone

Calista IP Phone

internet-phone

Dwyco Video Conferencing

ivisit

Emule / Edonkey

Laplink Host

Lotus NotesServer

NetMeeting

napster

mIRC

pcANYWERE host on network

PeopleCall

NTP (Network Time Protocol)

On the other hand, the ranges into which all the ports of a router are divided can also be distinguished.

Taking into account that there are three in total and are defined as:

• well known ports: These are usually the virtual doors that remain open and range from 0 to 1023. Thus, they are based on those assigned to operating systems and their serviceslike common communication protocols (Like, for example, HTTP).
• registered ports: They include a range between ports 1024 and 49151, they refer to those that are used for apps and games for users and normally, they are configured automatically during the installation of said applications or games.
• Private or dynamic ports: These contain ports between 49152 and 65535 and as their name indicates, they are dynamically assigned to client applications whenever they need to connect to a specific server. A clear example of this, are the P2P clients.

Steps to open the ports of a router correctly easy and fast

It should be noted that, depending on the user interface of each router and the differences between these devices of the same brand, it’s complicated cover all the steps to execute to open the ports of a WiFi router, in detail. Reason why, we will not be able to teach you 100% of the router settings.

However, ignoring some distinctions in the identification of each section in the menus and some other less relevant details, the vast majority of these devices agree on many aspects. So, to Next, we detail the most important clues for carry out a proper configuration In order to successfully open ports on your router:

Access the configuration interface of your router

The first thing you have to do is access the configuration interface of your WiFi device and after that, you have to enter the section “Port Forwarding”, “NAT” or “Advanced Options” of the router in question.

Fill in the information boxes

Once you access the section indicated above, you will find several boxes that you must fill in depending on the data of the ports you want to openthe protocol you are going to use and also the IP of the device to which the data should be sent.

It is highly relevant to limit that the number and type of data they can vary and will depend entirely on the router you are about to configure.

Emphasizing that, in general, the most common types of information that will fluctuate are:

Name

At this point, you have to indicate the application that is making use of the port configuration. Which will be extremely useful to identify the use that is being given to the port in question in the future.

In this sense, in certain cases, a list of applications and games will be displayed that preconfigure the rest of the fields correctly, once you select them.

LAN IP Address

Orders to which destination device data accessing the port being used should be redirected. It is important that enter the IP address of that device in which the specific application will be entered.

WAN IP Address

At this point, you will have to enter the address from which the information will be redirected and in general, corresponds to the IP address of the router.

Initial WAN Port

Here you will have to specify the number of the port you have to open. Taking into account that you can only open one port for the application that you are going to use or even, they offer you the possibility of opening a range of ports and in the latter case, you have to indicate the port of that range in the first place.

End WAN Port

Yes, you are only going to open one port, in this section you have to indicate the same port as the initial one. But, if it is a range of ports, you have to specify the last port of the rangebasically.

Start and End LAN Port

At both points, the same data is used as in the WAN configuration.

TCP/UDP protocol

This information must be indicated by the application or services that require opening the ports, as well as the port number that you must open. Bearing in mind that the difference between TCP and UDP is the mode of transmission of informationas we explained in the previous section of the post.

Save the router configuration

Finally, when you enter all these data, you will have to proceed to save the new router configuration and as a recommendation, it is very important that you also restart it. After that, you can check if the port has been opened successfully.

How to check if the port was opened successfully?

Once you carry out the detailed procedure, it is of great help verify or confirm that the configuration has been carried out correctly and for this, you have to perform some steps on your Windows PC or Mac computer.

What you have to do on Windows:

To confirm such an action, you have to run a command at the Windows command prompt. Thus, press the keyboard shortcut “Win ​​+ X” and select “Command Prompt (administrator)” from the menu that appears.

After completing the above, type the command “netstat –an” and press Enter to be able to run it. With which, you will see a list that lists all the ports to which the device has access and, of course, details the protocol that it is using.

So, you just have to look for the port you just opened to verify that it is open and also that the configuration is correct with respect to the protocol and the IP address in question.

The steps to follow in MacOS:

For Mac users, this check is much easier. Since, you only have to enter the “Network Utility”then press on “Port Scan”. Finally, you must enter your IP address and click “Explore” in order to verify the correct configuration. That’s it.