Nat type

[Flood2020]

Hi, 

I have a 4GEE router and it won’t let me connect my switch to online play it’s saying I have a Nat Type C (which is closed) I need a or b to be able to online play! 
I called EE and they reset all the settings as it should let me online play but it’s not can anyone help?? 

[XRaySpeX]

It's likely that you've come up against a limitation of EE's mobile network. The EE mobile network uses Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT), which means that you don't get your own public IP address but share it with other users. So you can't be uniquely id'ed on the Net & therefore your LAN cannot be addressed from outside for unsolicited accesses. This is unlike fixed BB.

[Flood2020]

Is there a way to change it?!

Sent from my iPhone

[XRaySpeX]

Not that I know of.

[c_c_crazymonkey]

Hi there,

I had this battle a few weeks ago (https://community.ee.co.uk/t5/4GEE-WiFi/4GEE-Home-WiFi-Router-Strict-NAT-Type/m-p/877029) and I was told the same thing. Frustrating I know. Seems like we're paying a lot of money for something we can't even use.

[jamesmacwhite]

I'm afraid CGNAT is common on mobile networks, because of the amount of individual devices requiring connectivity. Due to IPv4 exhaustion, mobile carriers don't have enough IPv4 space to allocate unique routed addresses, therefore they use CGNAT to share one across thousands. NAT unfortunately breaks end to end connectivity, which is what is often needed for the best experience in games.

The one solution to this is IPv6, but adoption of it is slow and most gaming platforms still use IPv4.

[wfo123]

Is there an easy to follow step-by-step guide to switch the 4GEE router to IPv6? 

I currently have a very disappointed 7 year unable to play Switch games online (Xbox works fine though).

[jamesmacwhite]

The 4GEE Home Router can support both IPv4 and IPv6 as dual stack with a bit of persuasion, however it might not help your situation if the Nintendo Switch is talking about NAT types that usually means it will be IPv4 based only which is where CGNAT is causing issues for you.

You can try changing the APN settings, but I'm not sure it's going to help. If the Nintendo Switch needs to make a direct connection to your device, with CGNAT in place it will break end to end connectivity and not be possible. The 4G network is different to fixed line broadband in this regard.

[XRaySpeX]

@wfo123 : See if the router has a Profile or APN where you can set APN Protocol to IPv6 but I'm not sure it'll help.

[wfo123]

This is what I see - looks like there's an option to select IPV6. Should I try it?