Nginx Load Balancing Configuration

Hi folks,

I am going to explain the process of load balancing the web application using Nginx

Pre-requisites

• One machine with Nginx installation
• Two machines with running the same web application

Test setup

All are Ubuntu server machines

1. 10.10.1.1 - Load Balancer
2. 10.10.1.2 - Node 1
3. 10.10.1.3 - Node 2

Configuration

In the Nginx server machine (10.10.1.1) do the following load balancing configuration

• Make sure you stop the nginx server if running

$ sudo service nginx stop

• Edit the nginx.conf file 

$ sudo vi /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

• Place the following sample content

http {
        upstream testsetup {
        server 10.10.1.2;
        server 10.10.1.3;
}
    server{
        listen 8090;
        server_name testsetup;
        location / {
            proxy_pass http://testsetup;
        }
    }
}

• Start the Nginx server

$ sudo service nginx start

Load Balancing Test

1. Access the 10.10.1.1:8090 in the web browser
2. It will redirect to Node 1 (10.10.1.2)
3. Refresh/Reload the page, the load balancer redirects to Node 2 (10.10.1.3)

Tip

To differentiate the web server, add a footer with different content (Static IP Address) in your index.html


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