How to port forward a Minecraft server? - 1

Via protocols

I'll do my best to instruct you on this, but please know that you may be limited in multiple fields.

The purpose of port forwarding is to bypass a level of security that your router gives you. The router receives incoming connections through certain locations, or ports, and then directs them where to go. Imagine them as roads. When you port forward, you assign your local ip address to a port. The port is the road, and the ip address is like your home address. So if I assign my local ip, 192.168.1.50 to port 3440, the next time my router receives a connection requesting access through port 3440 it will be sent to my computer.

What this means is that you need to change your router settings. The most common gateway for this is 192.168.1.1, which you input to your web browser. If this doesn't work you will need to search for the default gateway for your brand of router. There's a username and password requirement. Google search your router's brand and find the default username and password. If that doesn't work your parents probably changed the password to something else, meaning that you would have to talk to them.

Next you have to find the section regarding ports. It will ask you to type in an internal ip and port. To find your internal ip, open command prompt and type in ipconfig. Scroll down until you see IPv4 Address. This is the internal ip address of your computer. On your router's page you need to type in the desired port (25565 is default for Minecraft) to that internal ip. Apply all the settings and your port is now forwarded.

Make sure you add an exception in your Windows firewall (for both TCP and UDP). Search for firewall in the start menu firewall and click add exception.