NEW: remote port forwarding system expansion with pools

Hello! 
	 
	We're very glad to announce a remarkable expansion of our inbound remote port forwarding system aimed at avoiding once and for all the port exhaustion problem.
 


	 
	The comfort and the growth problem



	 



	In the AirVPN "Port Forwarding" service, unlike some of our competitors, we grant that assigned ports are not server specific. We also ensure that they remain permanently reserved to an account as long as any valid plan is active. This unique system offers unparalleled comfort as you don't have to worry about servers switches, zone selections and programs re-configuration. However, ports are only 65536, because the space reserved for them in a TCP/IP packet header is only 2 bytes, and the inconvenience of the great comfort brought by AirVPN service is that port exhaustion is near as more and more users decided to use the service.
 


	 



	 
 


	A "no compromise" solution



	 
 


	Our goal was to avoid port exhaustion while maintaining maximum comfort. We are introducing a new system specifically designed to achieve this goal. 
	 
	Now we allocate not only a port number, but a port number associated with a port pool. For example a port on pool :1 can be assigned to a user, and the same port in pool :2 can be assigned to another user. 
	Existing assigned port will come from the first pool (:1). Currently we offer two pools, but more pools can be added whenever necessary. With this method, port exhaustion is postponed indefinitely while the comfort of the service is preserved. 
	 
	In the following example you can see the pool (:1, :2 for now) specified right after the port number. The account has port 24860 reserved in both pools.
 


	 



	 
	



	 
	How it works 
	 



	 
 


	Each Air VPN server sends out clients' VPN traffic through a shared exit IP address. 
	From now on, AirVPN servers feature multiple exit IP addresses, each of which is linked to a specific port pool. Therefore we can determine which pool a port/address is associated with and route traffic accordingly.
 


	 



	 



	The implications for AirVPN users and customers 
	 



	The obvious good impact is that port availability increases dramatically. The new system is not difficult at all and extremely similar to the previous one: simply use DDNS (*) names with port forwarding, and not the direct IP address. Your account name(s) based on AirVPN's DDNS will always resolve into the correct server's exit-IP address related to the pool of your assigned port. 
	If you prefer to rely on IP addresses or anyway you don't want to define domain names through AirVPN's DDNS, you can find the correct IP address used by clicking the Test Open button available in your AirVPN account port panel. Please note that this IP address could change over time, so domain names defined by DDNS are a more comfortable solution. 
	Any setup not involving manual communication on how to connect to a service, as it happens typically with a p2p program for example, does not need domain names at all. 
	 
	(*) DDNS is a service offered automatically for free to all accounts and included on every and each AirVPN plan. 
	 
	Kind regards & datalove 
	AirVPN Staff

https://airvpn.org/forums/topic/63545-new-remote-port-forwarding-system-expansion-with-pools/?do=findComment&comment=239136