# How to Allow External Connections to Your Server on Oracle Cloud (Step-by-Step Guide)

Recently, I had to configure my server on Oracle Cloud. I had previously configured ports 443 and 80 for HTTPS traffic, but this time I needed to allow incoming connections on port **9093** for Kafka.

Naturally, I forgot how I had done this a year ago—because, of course, who remembers such things after that long? So I did what anyone would do: started Googling all over again.

I figured this would be the simplest way to keep track of documentation I might need later—so here we are. This is a quick, no-nonsense guide for future-me (and maybe even future-you) on how to allow external traffic to a specific port on an Oracle Cloud VPS.

1. Open Oracle Cloud Console
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933502337/9c1a4f14-46db-49c0-b255-26628bc12340.png align="center")
    
2. Go to VCN
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933578597/14986120-ae26-494f-b8e4-75d16072cccb.png align="center")
    
3. Select the VCN in which the current server is configured.
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933586287/620a559c-e96e-44c9-a308-2f2dfaa13599.png align="center")
    
4. Select the subnet in which the current server is configured.
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933616692/ffc5fcc4-0550-45aa-92e8-d85bb6cf3e3b.png align="center")
    
5. Select the Default Security List for `vcn-name` , where vcn-name would be the name of your VCN.
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933611892/546660e4-f6e3-4d67-a43e-eae8f63ceac1.png align="center")
    
6. Click on Add Ingress Rules and enter the following:
    
    `Source CIDR` : 0.0.0.0/0 (allow all)
    
    `Destination Port Range` : 9093
    
    `IP Protocol` : TCP
    
    `Description` : Kafka ( or anything you would like to write so that you remember which service you have reserved the port for )
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933636879/71268b04-4c3f-4326-85a3-e0670695ae80.png align="center")
    
    ![](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1748933640548/e2b72ed2-d132-40a0-a6f3-400602097bcc.png align="center")
    
7. Now Log on to your Server using SSH and Allow port 9093 to accept TCP Connections on port 9093 on the Firewall. (Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Ubuntu Installations use `iptables` by default )
    

```bash
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 9093 -j ACCEPT
```