How to open ports in Windows Firewall

When dealing with certain apps and processes on your Windows 10 PC, you might run issues if you aren’t connecting properly to the internet. If you’ve come across a potential fix that involves opening a certain port in your firewall, you might be wondering what exactly that process entails. This is a problem that can arise in plenty of situations, but especially when attempting to set up a VPN. If you suspect Windows Firewall is part of your connectivity issue, here’s how to open ports.

How to open a port for incoming traffic in Windows Firewall

Windows Firewall is designed as a security measure for your PC. To put it simply, a firewall analyzes incoming and outgoing connections to determine whether or not they’re threats. If you suspect that your Windows Firewall is causing connectivity issues, you can open a port for incoming traffic. Here’s how:

1. Right-click the Start button.
2. Click Search.

Type Windows Firewall.

Click Advanced settings.

Click New Rule… in the right frame of the window.

Click Next.

Click Specific local ports.

Click Next.

Click Next.

Click Next.

Click Finish.

How to open a port for outgoing traffic in Windows Firewall

The same set of steps listed above can be used to create a rule for outgoing traffic. In step No. 6, instead of clicking Inbound Rules, you’ll want to click Outgoing Rules. The rest of the steps are the same, and you can disable the rule in the same manner by using the steps in the next section.

How to close a port in Windows Firewall

Want to disable the rule you created to open a port in the Windows Firewall? Here’s how:

Right-click the Start button.

Click Search.

Click Windows Firewall.

Click Inbound Rules or Outbound Rules in the left frame of the window, depending on what type of rule you created.

Click the name of the rule in the right frame of the window.

Click Delete if you want to completely delete the rule.

More resources

Need a bit more help with Windows Firewall and Windows 10? We have plenty of resources covering a wide range of topics.

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Как открыть порты в Windows 10

От компьютера в интернет и наоборот передается огромное количество информации. Это делается с помощью службы, при которой зависимые от сети процессы ищут свободные транспортные протоколы TCP и UDP, а уже через них обращаются в сеть.

То есть данные отправляются на удаленные порты в пункте назначения или на веб-ресурс, к которому идет попытка подключения, а затем обратно – на локальные. Они используются всеми приложениями для связи с интернетом.

Операционная система управляет портами и гарантирует, что трафик направляется через «правильные», чтобы эти процессы могли подключаться к тем, которым необходимо.

Зачем может потребоваться открыть порт?

Брандмауэр Windows защищает компьютер от угроз (как сетевого трафика, так и от локальных приложений, которые пытаются получить доступ к нему). Когда одно устройство подключается к другому в сети, указывается номер порта, позволяющий принимающей стороне знать, как обрабатывать трафик. Если IP-адрес показывает трафику, как добраться до определенного устройства в сети, номер порта дает принимающей стороне информацию о том, какая программа получает этот трафик.

Брандмауэр блокирует все ненужные сетевые порты, и каждый раз, когда приложение или служба пытается установить связь за пределами устройства, он проверяет, есть ли в базе данных определенное правило, разрешающее или запрещающее доступ к сети. Если ему не удается найти правило, появляется запрос на определение и предоставление или отказ в разрешении.

Большинство портов закрыто по умолчанию, чтобы предотвратить вторжение вирусов или вредоносных программ. Однако пользователь может столкнуться с некоторыми проблемами подключения, особенно при попытке настроить VPN на компьютере или при использовании игрового сервера. Поэтому необходимо разрешить получение/отправку ограниченного трафика через брандмауэр. А для этого нужно открыть порт.

В брандмауэре системы

Если используется Microsoft Defender, и для работы приложения, игры или сервера требуется, чтобы один или несколько портов были открыты, следует выполнить простые действия.

Важно! Прежде чем продолжить, необходимо проверить документацию по поддержке приложения, чтобы узнать, какие порты и тип протокола потребуется открыть. Кроме того, можно быстро подтвердить, нужно ли открыть порт, временно отключив брандмауэр, и, если приложение работает с отключенным защитником, это означает, что необходимо создать новое правило.

How to Check for Ports in Use in Windows 10

At any one time, there’s a whole bunch of information being sent between your Windows 10 PC and the endless void of the Internet. This is done using a process whereby network-dependent processes seek out TCP and UDP ports, which they use to communicate with the Internet. First, your data gets sent to remote ports at the destination or website your processes are trying to connect to, then it gets received at local ports back on your PC.

Most of the time, Windows 10 knows how to manage ports and ensure that traffic is being directed through the right ports so that those processes can connect with what they need to. But sometimes two processes may be assigned to one port, or maybe you just want to get a better picture of your network traffic and what’s going in and out.

That’s why wrote this guide that shows you how to get an overview of your ports and see which applications are using which ports.

Use Nirsoft CurrPorts

NirSoft is one of the best indie software developers, giving us great utilities, like PassView and WirelessKeyView. While some people will prefer checking their ports without installing third-party software (in which case, scroll down to the CMD method), CurrPorts is easily the fastest and most convenient way to view your ports.

Once you’ve installed CurrPorts, just open it to see a list of all your ports currently in use. If you’re looking for local ports in use, just click the “Local Port” column at the top to order the list by port number (handy if you’re looking for a specific one). You can do the same thing with remote ports, too.

If you want to really find specific ports, click the “Advanced Filters” icon at the top and enter your string in the format they suggest. It should look something like the below image.

Hit OK when you’re ready, and the list will filter down to your queries.

Command Prompt Method

The integrated – though not necessarily the simplest – way to check open ports is to use the trusty command prompt.

Click the Start button, type cmd , then right-click “Command Prompt” when it shows up in the search results. Click “Run as administrator.”

Once you’re in the elevated command prompt, enter the following command:

This will steadily bring up a list of ports that is probably quite long, along with the Windows processes that are using them. (You can press Ctrl + A , then Ctrl + C to copy all information to the clipboard.) On the average PC, there will be two main local IP addresses that contain ports on your PC.

The first, in our case, is “127.0.0.1.” This IP address is otherwise known as “localhost” or a “loopback address,” and any process listening to ports here is communicating internally on your local network without using any network interface. The actual port is the number you see after the colon. (See image below.)

The bulk of your processes will probably be listening to ports prefixed with “192.168.xxx.xxx,” which is your IP address. This means the processes you see listed here are listening for communications from remote Internet locations (such as websites). Again, the port number is the number after the colon.

TCPView

If you don’t mind installing a third-party app and want to have more control over what’s going on with all your ports, you can use a lightweight app called TCPView. This immediately brings up a list of processes and their associated ports.

What make this better than the command prompt is that you can actively see the ports opening, closing and sending packets. Just look for the green, red and yellow highlights. You can also reorder the list by clicking the column headings, making it easier to find the process you want or two separate processes vying for the same port.

If you do find a process or connection you want to close, just right-click that process. You can then select “End process,” which is exactly the same function as the one in Windows task manager. Or you can click “Close Connection” to leave the process open but stop it from listening on a given port.

If you’re having some trouble in Windows 10, then see whether a Windows update may be causing it. We also have a handy guide for managing the health of your hard drive in Windows 10.

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Content Manager at Make Tech Easier. Enjoys Android, Windows, and tinkering with retro console emulation to breaking point.

TCPView v4.0

By Mark Russinovich

Published: March 23, 2021

В Download TCPView (1.4 MB)
Run now from Sysinternals Live.

Introduction

TCPView is a Windows program that will show you detailed listings of all TCP and UDP endpoints on your system, including the local and remote addresses and state of TCP connections. On Windows Server 2008, Vista, and XP, TCPView also reports the name of the process that owns the endpoint. TCPView provides a more informative and conveniently presented subset of the Netstat program that ships with Windows. The TCPView download includes Tcpvcon, a command-line version with the same functionality.

Using TCPView

When you start TCPView it will enumerate all active TCP and UDP endpoints, resolving all IP addresses to their domain name versions. You can use a toolbar button or menu item to toggle the display of resolved names. On Windows XP systems, TCPView shows the name of the process that owns each endpoint.

By default, TCPView updates every second, but you can use the Options|Refresh Rate menu item to change the rate. Endpoints that change state from one update to the next are highlighted in yellow; those that are deleted are shown in red, and new endpoints are shown in green.

You can close established TCP/IP connections (those labeled with a state of ESTABLISHED) by selecting File|Close Connections, or by right-clicking on a connection and choosing Close Connections from the resulting context menu.

You can save TCPView’s output window to a file using the Save menu item.

Using Tcpvcon

Tcpvcon usage is similar to that of the built-in Windows netstat utility:

Usage:

Parameter	Description
-a	Show all endpoints (default is to show established TCP connections).
-c	Print output as CSV.
-n	Don’t resolve addresses.

Microsoft TCPView KB Article

This Microsoft KB article references TCPView:

В Download TCPView (1.4 MB)

Run now from Sysinternals Live.

Runs on:

• Client: Windows 8.1 and higher.
• Server: Windows Server 2012 and higher.

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