How to Port Forward Battlefield 3

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Port Forward Staff
September 19, 2018 (Last Updated: ) | Reading Time: 3 minutes

Battlefield 3 is a Shooter, First-Person, Tactical, and Action game published by Electronic Arts released in 2011.

battlefield 3 logo
battlefield 3 logo

Battlefield 3 has the following styles of play.

How to Port Forward Battlefield 3

When you are playing Battlefield 3 you might need to forward some ports in your router. Forwarding ports is a useful trick in gaming because it can really help to make your network connection most stable and sometimes even faster. Routers were not designed to allow incoming network requests and some games can play tremendously better if an incoming connection is forwarded through the router to the game.

Use a VPN Instead

Have you considered using a VPN instead of forwarding a port? For most users, a VPN is a much simpler and more secure choice than forwarding a port.

We use and recommend NordVPN because not only is it the fastest VPN, it includes a new feature called Meshnet that makes forwarding a port no longer necessary for most applications. With NordVPN Meshnet, you can connect to your devices from anywhere in the world, completely secure, over a highly encrypted VPN tunnel.

When shopping for a VPN, make sure that they meet the following criteria:

This is the list of requirements that we used when we were shopping around for a VPN provider. There are lots of free, shady VPN providers out there that we looked at and dismissed.

Based in Panama, using diskless servers, and with over 6,100 servers in 61 countries, we can safely say that NordVPN satisfies all of these requirements.

NordVPN is the fastest VPN!

Once you've set up your NordVPN account on multiple computers and enabled Meshnet, you can seamlessly access all of your devices as if they were on the same network. You don't even have to log in to your router. It's very simple.

Every time you click on one of our affiliate links, such as NordVPN, we get a little kickback for introducing you to the service. Think of us as your VPN wingman.

Before You Forward a Port

Before you can forward a port you need to know the following things:

How to locate your router's IP Address

The easiest way to find your router's IP address is to run our free Router Detector utility. It's a part of the Network Utilities suite of tools and it's completely free to use.

How To Forward Ports

A smart way to forward your ports is to use Network Utilities. Since Network Utilities allows you to both forward and un-forward ports easily you can keep your network security maximized, and then forward ports only when you need them. Alternatively you can do it by hand.

The general process for forwarding a port is:

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NordVPN is the fastest VPN deal!

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Ports Required for Battlefield 3

The required ports that need to be forwarded for Battlefield 3 are as follows:

Battlefield 3 - PC

  • TCP: 9988, 17502, 20000-20100, 22990, 42127
  • UDP: 3659, 14000-14016, 22990-23006, 25200-25300

Battlefield 3 - Playstation 3

  • TCP: 3478-3480, 5223, 8080, 9988, 10000-10100, 17502, 42127
  • UDP: 3074, 3478-3479, 3658-3659, 14000-14016

Battlefield 3 - Xbox 360

  • TCP: 3074
  • UDP: 88, 3074

Battlefield 3 - Steam

  • TCP: 9988, 17502, 20000-20100, 22990, 27015-27030, 27036-27037, 42127
  • UDP: 3659, 4380, 14000-14016, 22990-23006, 25200-25300, 27000-27031, 27036

If you want to follow guides that are custom tailored to your exact router and Battlefield 3 simply follow one of these links:

That's all it takes to forward your ports. Have more games that need a boost? Check out our growing list of games and applications.

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