Port Forwarding

Tags:

• Network

What Is Port Forwarding?

Port forwarding is a feature that allows traffic entering through a router’s port to reach a specific port on a device connected to that router.

For example, if a computer and a phone are connected to a router and you simply enter the router address plus a port number, the router does not know which device’s port the request should go to. Port forwarding can therefore be understood as forwarding a router’s port to the port of a device connected to it. It can also be described as assigning a port number on the router to a specific device and that device’s port. For example, connecting to port 180 on the router can lead to port 5000 on the phone, while connecting to port 280 can lead to port 5000 on the computer. The work of assigning values such as 180 and 280 is port forwarding.