How To Enable Ping In Windows Server 2019 Firewall

By default in Windows Server 2019 the Windows Firewall is configured to drop all inbound ICMP traffic. This includes echo requests which are used by the ping command, which can make network troubleshooting difficult.

In this guide we will cover how to allow ping through Windows Firewall in Windows Server 2019.

A common response is usually to simply disable Windows Firewall entirely, however this is not recommended as the Windows Firewall does a good job at providing a basic level of system protection. We will only be allowing the specific rules required to allow ping to succeed.

Allow ping through Windows Firewall

  1. First we need to open Windows Firewall, this can be done a few ways. My favourite method is to simply hit the Windows key to open start, then start typing firewall. As shown below Windows Firewall with Advanced Security should show, click this.
    Windows Server 2019 Start Menu - Open Windows Firewall

    Alternatively you can simply type ‘firewall’ and press enter in PowerShell to open the basic firewall interface, then click “Advanced settings” on the left hand side – this will open the same interface listed in the start menu.

  2. From the Windows Firewall with Advanced Security window that opens up, select Inbound Rules from the menu on the left.

    Inbound Windows Firewall Rules

  3. From the rules listed under Inbound Rules, select “File and printer Sharing (Echo Request – ICMPv4-In)” and enable the rule.

    Windows Firewall enable inbound ICMP

    Note that this will only allow IPv4 requests in, if you need IPv6 then you will want to enable the “File and Printer Sharing (Echo Request – ICMPv6-In)” rule, listed just below.



  4. Once enabled the server should now respond to ping requests. From my desktop I begun to ping my Windows Server 2019 virtual machine at 192.168.75.133 before enabling the rule, and then again after enabling it. You can see below that the first requests timed out, as inbound ICMP requests were disabled by default in Windows Server 2019. After enabling the ICMP rule, the ping requests succeed, confirming that this is working as expected.

    Command Prompt Ping Example

Summary

By Default Windows Firewall prevents ICMP echo requests, this results in the server not responding to ping. By enabling this firewall rule we have enabled ping in Windows Server 2019, which can help us with network troubleshooting.

  1. How can we do in powershell

  2. Luc Prefontaine

    Microsoft your abysmal level of stupidity never deceive me.
    Sure I want to sniff network traffic every time I need to
    check if that rotten server is up…
    Idiots. Let me decide what level of security I need.
    Bureaucrats. What a f..g idiotic idea.

  3. thx for nice article

  4. Did not work for me. Did everything you suggested, and if fact the firewall setting you cited was already set.

    Had same symptoms you had, but the results were not the same in Windows 2019 Domain contrller.

    Check the route table on both computers and try adding the route on the computer that is not receiving the ping echo.

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