Ports·17
17
qotd
TCP and UDP · 0x0011

Port 17 — qotd

Others

Port 17 carries Quote of the day over TCP and UDP. Being at or below 1023, only root may open it on Unix.

0–1023. On Unix only root may open one.

Where it sits in 65535

A port number is 16 bits, so it stops at 65535. The narrow band at the left is everything up to 1023.

065535
Service
Quote of the day (qotd)
Kind
Others
Protocol
TCP and UDP
Range
Well-known
Root needed
Yes
Hexadecimal
0x0011
Binary
0000000000010001
Two bytes
0 · 17

Same kind

Time, printing, play — the ones that fit nowhere else.

Ports next to it

How to read this

  • A port number is 16 bits, so it runs 0 to 65535. There is no port 65536.
  • Opening anything at or below 1023 needs root on Unix.
  • Plain and encrypted often live on different numbers — 80 and 443, for one.
  • Numbers like 3000 and 8080 were never registered; those are marked as custom.

Frequently asked questions

Q. What is port 17 used for?

Quote of the day (qotd) uses it, over both TCP and UDP.

Q. Does opening port 17 need root?

Yes. It is at or below 1023, so on Unix only root may open it.

Q. Which range does port 17 fall in?

Well-known (0–1023). In hex it is 0x0011.

Q. Does port 17 have a twin?

Not a separate one. It either was encrypted from the start or negotiates TLS on the same number.