In the gaming world there's nothing better than a wide open connection to the internet. Unfortunately we all have routers that we play through which cause numerous problems in multiplayer games. Most console games report this as NAT Type. The holy grail of gaming is NAT Type Open.
You want NAT Type Open. It's worth it. Even in Overwatch where Blizzard has made the lobby experience as painless as possible there are still many reasons to forward a port in your router.
Overwatch is absolutely riddled with problems related to having NAT Type Strict or NAT Type Moderate. When your router prevents Overwatch from talking on the internet as it should there are many things that can go wrong. Some of the problems in Overwatch that are fixed by getting NAT Type Open are:
- Voice chat that either never connects or constantly drops.
- Not being able to join a lobby with your friends.
- Excessive lag.
- Never, ever, winning.
Wait, what? Never winning?
If you have NAT Type Strict then you are likely to never be the lobby host, which means you will have the worst ping times, which means in a head to head, sniper vs. sniper duel, you will almost always lose. See, you're not as bad as you thought!
There are many features of Overwatch that simply work better with NAT Type Open. If you have NAT Type Moderate or NAT Type Strict then you really need to go through the work to get that changed to NAT Type Open.
Overwatch Ports
Getting NAT Type Open in Overwatch is usually simply a matter of logging in to your router and setting up some ports in the Port Forwarding section of your router. The ports that you need to forward depend on which platform you are playing on.
Overwatch - PC
- TCP: 1119, 3724, 6113
- UDP: 5060, 5062, 6250, 3478-3479, 12000-64000
Overwatch - Playstation 4
- TCP: 1119, 1935, 3478-3480, 3724, 6113
- UDP: 3074, 3478-3479, 5060, 5062, 6250, 12000-64000
Overwatch - Xbox One
- TCP: 1119, 3074, 3724, 6113
- UDP: 88, 500, 3074, 3478-3479, 3544, 4500, 5060, 5062, 6250, 12000-64000
Overwatch - Switch
- TCP: 1119, 3724, 6113, 6667, 12400, 28910, 29900-29901, 29920
- UDP: 1-65535
If you are having a difficult time getting this setup or logging in to your router then we have guides for every router customized to Overwatch. You can find our guides by clicking one of the links below and then picking your router from the list.
When you get to the router guide the Overwatch ports should be filled in the correct boxes for your router.
