Add firewall rules to Lightsail instances - Amazon Lightsail
Add and edit instance firewall rules

Add firewall rules to Lightsail instances

You can add rules to the IPv4 and IPv6 firewalls of your Amazon Lightsail instance to control the traffic that is allowed to connect to it. When you add a firewall rule, you can specify the application layer protocol type, protocol, ports, and the source IPv4 or IPv6 addresses that are allowed to connect to your instance. For more information about firewalls, see Firewalls and ports.

Add and edit instance firewall rules

Complete the following steps to add or edit firewall rules in the Lightsail console.

  1. Sign in to the Lightsail console.

  2. In the left navigation pane, choose Instances.

  3. Choose the name of the instance for which you want to add or edit a firewall rule.

  4. Choose the Networking tab on your instance's management page.

    The Networking tab displays your instance's public and private IP addresses, and the configured IPv4 or IPv6 firewalls for your instance.

    Note

    The IPv6 firewall is displayed only if you have enabled IPv6 for the instance. For more information, see Enable or disable IPv6.

  5. Complete one of the following steps depending on whether the source IP for the rule is an IPv4 or IPv6 address:

    • To add an IPv4 firewall rule, scroll down to the IPv4 Firewall section of the page, and choose Add rule.

    • To add an IPv6 firewall rule, scroll down to the IPv6 Firewall section of the page and choose Add rule.

    You can also choose Edit (pencil icon) next to an existing rule on either of the firewalls to edit it.

  6. Choose an application layer protocol type in the Application drop-down menu.

    When you choose an application layer protocol type, a set of protocol and port presets are specified for you. Example values are Custom, All TCP, All UDP, Custom ICMP, SSH, and RDP.

    You can configure the following optional settings depending on the application layer protocol type you select:

    • (Optional) If you choose the Custom option, then you can select a value in the Protocol drop-down menu. The available protocol values are TCP and UDP.

      You can also enter a single port number or range of port numbers (for example, 7000-8000) in the Port field.

    • (Optional) If you choose the Custom ICMP option, then you can specify an ICMP type in the Type field, and an ICMP code in the Code field. For more information about ICMP types and codes, see Control Messages on Wikipedia.

      Note

      When you add an ICMP rule to the IPv6 firewall of your instance using the Lightsail console, the rule is automatically configured to use ICMPv6. For more information, see Internet Control Message Protocol for IPv6 on Wikipedia.

    • (Optional) Select Restrict to IP address to restrict access for the specified protocol and port to a specific IP address or range of IP addresses. Leave this option unselected to allow all IP addresses for the specified protocol and port.

      You can enter a single IPv4 address (for example, 203.0.113.1), or a range of IPv4 addresses. The range can be specified using a dash (for example, 192.0.2.0-192.0.2.255) or in CIDR block notation (for example, 192.0.2.0/24). For more information about CIDR block notation, see Classless Inter-Domain Routing on Wikipedia.

    • (Optional) If you choose the SSH or RDP application layer protocol type, and then choose Restrict to IP address, you can choose Allow Lightsail browser SSH/RDP to allow connection to your instance using the browser-based SSH and RDP clients available in the Lightsail console. Leave this option unselected to block access through those browser-based clients.

  7. Choose Create to add the rule to the firewall.

    The firewall rule is added after a few moments.