diff --git a/testing/cypress.json b/testing/cypress.json
index e18754fa569e45f439936214f1eb3f676ca702ac..f453add580fa5c05820bd31dd32052c357ce7c97 100644
--- a/testing/cypress.json
+++ b/testing/cypress.json
@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
 {
-    "baseUrl": "http://localhost:80"
+    "baseUrl": "127.0.0.1:80"
 }
diff --git a/testing/run_integration_test.sh b/testing/run_integration_test.sh
index 9c9958c1aa19982b5d84cb3b2c29dec9cdd9e303..b9f718005f797cdefc3a5ad5799ef2518ce53f8b 100755
--- a/testing/run_integration_test.sh
+++ b/testing/run_integration_test.sh
@@ -33,8 +33,12 @@ done
 kubectl cp default/`kubectl get po -l app.kubernetes.io/name=registrar -o name | cut -d'/' -f2 `:/mnt/ /mnt/registrar
 
 # run tests (i.e. verification of output of above commands)
+
+# expose database, renderer and client ports externally
 kubectl port-forward svc/my-helm-release-database 5432:5432 &
 kubectl port-forward svc/my-helm-release-client 80:80 &
+kubectl port-forward svc/my-helm-release-renderer 81:81 &
+
 KUBECTL_PORT_FORWARD_PID=$!
 
 pytest test_preprocessor.py test_registrar.py
@@ -53,10 +57,6 @@ kubectl exec deployment/my-helm-release-ingestor -- ls /var/ingestor/success > s
 kubectl exec deployment/my-helm-release-ingestor -- ls /var/ingestor/fail > failure_list.csv
 
 # client testing
-
-
-wget 127.0.0.1:80
-
 docker run --name cypress --network host -v ${PWD}:/mnt/ --rm -t --user 1000:1000 cypress/browsers:node16.14.0-slim-chrome99-ff97 bash -c "cd /mnt && npm ci && npm run e2e"
 # fetch logs for ingestor tests
 kubectl logs $(kubectl get po -l app.kubernetes.io/name=ingestor -o name | cut -d'/' -f2) > ingestor_log.txt