How to Install NGINX on cPanel

installing nginx on cpanel hero image

In this article, we will outline how to install the popular NGINX web server software on your VPS or Dedicated Hosting account. Installing this software allows your web server to cache content and increase server performance. This ultimately translates into faster websites and better experiences for end users. The installation process requires both root WHM and SSH access and is only recommended for users with familiarity with Command Line Interfaces (CLI). As this process requires root-level access, it can only be performed on VPS or Dedicated Hosting accounts.

Topics Include:

Changing Listening Ports

  1. First, log into WHM as the root user.
  2. Next, click the Tweak Settings link in the Server Configuration section.
  3. On the Tweak Settings page click the “>” to scroll, then click the System tab when you see it.
  4. Scroll down to the Apache non-SSL IP/port options and select the box to change ports. Since we want to set the listening ports to 8080 for InMotion servers, enter the following:

    0.0.0.0:8080
  5. Navigate to the Apache SSL port setting and select the box to change the ports. Since InMotion uses port 8443 enter the following:

    0.0.0.0:8443
  6. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the Save button to open the listening ports.

Installing NGINX

  1. First, connect to your server as the root user via SSH.
  2. Once logged in, run the following command:

    yum -y install imh-ultrastack-ded
  3. You will see the following message, type ‘y’, then press the enter key.

    Install 1 Package
    Total download size: 484 k
    Installed size: 1.3 M
    Is this ok [y/d/N]: y


    The software has been installed successfully when you see a message such as this:

    Installed:
    imh-nginx.x86_64 0:1.13.3-2.el7
    Complete!

Congratulations, you have now installed NGINX!

More Resources

To take full advantage of everything NGINX has to offer, please see the following resources:

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5 thoughts on “How to Install NGINX on cPanel

  1. Thank you for the well informative blog,l was searching all over the internet for this information.
    l’m reading through similar blogs so that l can be able to create professional blogs like this one.

    1. Hi Bill! Like anything technical, it’s never an easy answer. NGINX is the newer product and tends to perform better overall– especially with modern WordPress sites which really seem to benefit from NGINX optimization. The trade-off here is that a newer product can mean slightly more work for your SysAdmin if they aren’t familiar with it. For a couple of years it seemed like EasyApache was the more stable choice, but by this point more admins are familiar with NGINX and NGINX has gone through more iterations.

      So, you’re probably going to see benefits if you’re running a WordPress site– which is why our WordPress Optimized hosting plans all use NGINX. For a non-WordPress site, it’s harder to say. Certain site architectures may not benefit from NGINX as much as others and you have to weigh that against the problems of switching to a new set-up.

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