How to forward WSL2 port to Windows port and vice versa

WSL2-Windows_port-forward.md

Ref:

• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/networking
• https://superuser.com/questions/1679757/how-to-access-windows-localhost-from-wsl2

WSL2 to Windows

1. Obtain the IP address of your host machine (Windows) by running this command from your Linux distribution:

cat /etc/resolv.conf

2. Copy the IP address following the term: nameserver.
3. Add rule to Firewall so that incoming connections to the target Windows port is allowed.

New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName "<Alias>" -InterfaceAlias "vEthernet (WSL)" -Direction Inbound -Protocol TCP -LocalPort <Win_port> -Action Allow

5. Connect to any Windows server using the copied IP address

Alternatively Windows server can be accessed with the host/domain: "$(hostname).local"

Alternatively IP of the Windows server may be accessed from

ip route show | grep -i default | awk '{ print $3}'

Port forward from Windows to WSL2

Powershell command:

netsh interface portproxy add v4tov4 listenport=<Win_port> listenaddress=0.0.0.0 connectport=<WSL2_port> connectaddress=<WSL2_IP>

Obtain <WSL2_IP> from

wsl hostname -I

To see existing port-forwardings:

netsh interface portproxy show all

To delete a particular port-forwarding:

netsh interface portproxy delete v4tov4 listenport=<port> listenaddress=<IP>