A Netgate pfSense router contains a basic firewall to help protect your home network. A Firewall blocks incoming connections by nature. Sometimes you need to unblock some of these connections so you can run a game or application. This is called opening a port or port forwarding. Port forwarding is literally forwarding a port from the internet to your home network.
Follow these steps to open a port in your Netgate pfSense router:
- Set up a static IP address on the device or computer you are forwarding these ports to.
- Go ahead and log in to your Netgate pfSense router.
- Find the Port Forward section in your Netgate pfSense router.
- Find the Firewall tab located near the top of the screen and click it.
- Click on NAT.
- Go ahead and create a Port Forward entry.
The process of opening ports in your router may seem like a difficult task. If so, you are not alone! We are here to help walk you through the steps to open a port in the Netgate pfSense router.
We think that forwarding a port should be easy. That's why we created Network Utilities. Our software does everything that you need to forward a port.
When you use Network Utilities you get your port forwarded right now!
Setup A Static IP Address
In order to ensure that your ports remain open in your device even after it reboots, it is important to set up a static IP address in your device.
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Recommended - Our free program will setup a static IP address for you.
â Download Network Utilities today!
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Or follow our Static IP Address guides to setup a static IP address.
After setting up a static ip address on your devices you need to login to your router.
Login To Your Netgate Router
Log in to your Netgate pfSense router. To log in you will need to use a web browser since the Netgate pfSense uses a web interface to access router configurations.
Open up whichever internet browser that you are comfortable with. If you are not sure which one to use, then go ahead and open Chrome, Firefox, or Edge.
To help with confusion, we have simplified this step for you with this link: Login to your pfSense Router
Once you have opened a web browser, find the address bar which is usually located at the top of the screen. The image below shows an example of this.
Above is an example of what a web browser address bar looks like. Find the address bar in your web browser and type in your router's IP address.
The Netgate pfSense router's default IP address is: 192.168.1.1
After typing your router's IP address into the address bar, make sure to click the enter button on your keyboard. You should see a box similar to the one shown below.
Go ahead and enter the username and password for the Netgate pfSense router in the spaces available. Remember if you have changed them in the past, you need to enter those values.
- The default Netgate pfSense Router Username is: admin
- The default Netgate pfSense Router Password is: pfsense
Enter your username and password, and then click the Sign In button to log in to your Netgate pfSense router.
Netgate Usernames and Passwords
If the username or password did not work check out our Default Netgate Router Passwords page.
If you are unable to log in even after trying the above list of passwords you may need to consider a reset for your router. Our guide How to Reset a Router can help you with that. After resetting the Netgate pfSense router your username and password will be reverted back to factory defaults.
Find the Port Forwarding Section
You should be on the home page of your Netgate pfSense router once you have successfully logged in. Find the Port Forward section of your router.
- Click the Firewall tab at the top of the screen.
- Click NAT.
You should now be on a page that says Port Forward.
Create A Port Forward
Forwarding ports in your router creates a path that allows data to get through your network firewall, and this could lead to malicious traffic on your network. So make sure that you must forward a port before actually doing so. However, the risk is very low, so do not let this warning stop you from making this change if you need to.
Here are the ports to forward for Xbox Live:
- TCP Ports: 3074
- UDP Ports: 3074
If you are looking for the ports for a different application you can find it by either:
- Browsing our List of Games
- Check out our our List of Games by Genre
- See our List of all Applications
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To start creating an entry, click on the button called Add.
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Select WAN from the Interface drop-down box.
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Select IPv4 from the Address Family drop-down if this forward is for an IPv4 address, or select IPv6 if this is for an IPv6 address.
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In the Protocol dropdown box, select the protocol type of the ports you are forwarding. Choose Both if your router has that option. Otherwise, choose either TCP or UDP as needed. If you need to forward a port for both TCP and UDP and your router does not have the Both option, then you need to create two entries.
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In the Destination port range section, select Other from both the From port and To port drop-down boxes.
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Still in the Destination port range section, go ahead and enter the port number into the From port and the To port boxes, to forward a single port. To forward a range of ports, enter the lowest number of that range into the From port box and then enter the highest number of that range into the To port box.
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Choose Single host from the Redirect target IP Type drop-down box.
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Find the Redirect target IP Address box and enter the IP address that you want ports forwarded to. This can be either the IP address of your computer or any other IP address for devices on your network that you want to forward ports for.
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Choose Other from the Redirect target port drop-down list.
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In the Redirect target port Custom box, enter the same values that you entered into the Destination port range From port box.
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Type in a name for this forward in the Description box. Choose a name that will help you remember why this forward was set up since it does not affect the functionality of the forward.
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Choose Add associated filter rule from the Filter rule association drop-down box.
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Click the Save button at the bottom of the page when you are completely finished to apply these changes.
Test If Your Ports Are Open
Finally, I strongly recommend testing to see if you forwarded the Netgate pfSense ports correctly. To do this you can use our Network Utilities tool, which includes a free Open Port Checker. Open Port Checker is the only online port checking tool that has Guaranteed Results.
Check Out These Helpful Guides:
- Our software called Network Utilities does all of this and more.
- Find detailed tips on how to Setup your router.
- A great list of games and applications that require port forwarding along with their related port numbers.
