Let players join your game server without port forwarding
Run the NatchPlay agent next to your server and it gets an address players can reach from anywhere, through our relays in Europe, the US, Australia and Singapore. Your router stays as it is and players connect to the relay, never to your house.
How it works
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1
Install the agent
On the PC or Linux box your server runs on. It runs in the background and starts with the machine.
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2
Start your server
The agent sees which ports it's listening on and offers them. Popular games come set up and admin ports stay private.
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3
Share your address
Minecraft players join on the name alone. Everyone else adds the port the agent shows you.
yourname.natchplay.com
Two ways to connect a server
Pick one for each server. A relay address makes your PC look like a rented server to the game, a tunnel leaves your network exactly as it is.
| Compared | Relay address | Tunnel |
|---|---|---|
| What happens | Your PC gets an address on our relay through the VPN client built into Windows, or a tunnel on Linux and macOS. The game listens on it like a server with a public IP. | The agent carries the game's ports from the relay to your server. Nothing new appears on your network. |
| Steam server browser | Lists your server at the relay address | Depends on the game. Steam can list it at your home IP, or not at all |
| Players' IPs | Your server sees every player's real IP | Shown on your relay's page and passed on to games that read PROXY protocol, like Paper and Velocity |
| Ports | Every port the game opens | The game's own ports, set up for you |
| Pick it for | Steam games and anything that checks its own public address | Minecraft, or when you'd rather not add a network adapter |
Built for game traffic
What a game server needs from a relay. NatchPlay is built around these.
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Drops come back without kicking anyone
If your home connection blips, the agent reconnects and players carry on where they were. Your relay's page says what dropped and when.
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UDP stays UDP
Rust, Valheim and Palworld send their traffic as datagrams. We carry them as datagrams, so one lost packet never holds up the ones behind it, which is where tunnel rubber-banding comes from.
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Real player IPs
With a relay address your server sees who's connecting, so bans and per-player limits work the way they would on a rented server.
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Listed at the right address
Steam lists a server at the address its traffic comes from. With a relay address that's ours, never your home IP.
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A live page for every relay
Bandwidth as it happens, every player's ping and packet loss, plus the tunnel's own state.
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The region near your players
Europe, US East, Australia or Singapore. One server can be in more than one at once.
Latency we've measured
Measured on the relay NatchPlay grows out of, with a real Minecraft server and a logged-in client. NatchPlay's own numbers will be published the same way.
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<1ms
Added by the relay itself, from a player's packet arriving to it leaving for your server.
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18.8ms
A logged-in Minecraft test client's ping through the Europe relay, the average of 109, with the player and the server both on a PC in the UK. Measured 4 October 2026.
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9ms
An ICMP ping from the same PC to the Europe relay. Through the relay a ping makes that trip twice and the relay adds under a millisecond.
Questions people ask
Do I need to forward a port?
No. The agent connects out to our relay the way a browser connects to a website, so your router lets it through. Players connect to the relay instead of your house.
Does it work behind CGNAT?
Yes. CGNAT is when your internet provider shares one public IP between lots of homes, which makes port forwarding impossible. It's common on Starlink and mobile broadband. NatchPlay only needs your server to reach the internet, so CGNAT doesn't get in the way.
Will players see my home IP?
Not through the relay. Players connect to the relay's address, never to your house.
One catch with a tunnel: a Steam game reports itself to Steam from your own connection, so Steam's server list can show your home IP. A relay address stops that, Steam lists the relay instead. That's why Steam games are better on a relay address.
Will it add lag?
The relay itself adds under a millisecond. What players feel is distance, from them to the relay and from the relay to you, so pick the region closest to most of your players.
Which games work?
Any game that lets you host a dedicated server or a listen server on a port. The ones on the games page have their ports written in, any other game works with its ports set by hand.
Who runs NatchPlay?
Natchland, who also makes MC Server Manager and NatchGSM. NatchPlay grows out of MC Server Manager's relay, which already carries players to real Minecraft servers every day.