Bitcoin has only 8 active connections, and I read somewhere that it helps to forward ports. I know how to forward a port, but which port should I forward, and how should I tell Bitcoin-qt to use the forwarded port?
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8 connections is more than enough for your client to pull blocks from the bitcoin network. So adding more doesn't help you, at least not directly. But it does help the bitcoin network if your node is accessible to others.– Stephen GornickFeb 20, 2013 at 22:07
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1 Answer
Bitcoin has only 8 active connections
Correction: it has 8 outbound connections. By default, it can also accept up to 117 inbound connections
which port
Port 8333, TCP
how should I tell Bitcoin-qt to use the forwarded port?
Don't need to.
answered Feb 20, 2013 at 19:59
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OK, so does forwarding the port increase the number of outbound connections? Feb 20, 2013 at 20:01
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No, but it makes it possible to get inbound connections, which helps the network. Feb 20, 2013 at 20:02
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So why does Bitcoin-qt only have 8 outbound connections? Is there any way to increase this? Feb 20, 2013 at 20:05
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1Yes, go into the source code and modify
MAX_OUTBOUND_CONNECTIONS, then recompile. Feb 20, 2013 at 20:13 -
1Incidentally, adding more than 8 outbound connections doesn't necessarily help you ... it can actually put additional work for your system and consume inbound connections elsewhere that others might have used instead. Feb 20, 2013 at 22:09