Skip to main content

Nginx

Nginx is a high-performance web server, reverse proxy, and load balancer known for its speed, scalability, and reliability. It is widely used to serve static content, handle HTTP requests, and manage traffic for web applications.

Serving static files​

This guide walks you through deploying a simple static website with Nginx on lttle.cloud, from basic setup to adding flash mode for cost-efficient serverless hosting.

Recommendations

To reduce compute and memory usage, there are certain Nginx optimizations that we recommend

  • Pre-compressing static files. Our example uses gzip compression with the gzip_static module. Or if you use Nginx Plus, you can use the brotli_static module for better compression ratios.
  • Using the sendfile and sendfile_max_chunk directives to optimize file transfers
  • Using the tcp_nopush directive to improve network performance
  • Allocating minimal resources since Nginx is lightweight
tip

If you want to skip the explanations, you can find the complete final example in our GitHub Samples » Nginx » Custom Nginx Server with Dockerfile.

Creating the static site​

Create a file named index.html with any content you like, for example:

echo "Hello from Nginx via lttle.cloud! (custom dockerfile)" > index.html

Or you can use any static site generator or framework to create a more complex static site.

Nginx configuration​

Create a file named nginx.conf with the following content:

nginx.conf
server {
    listen      80;
    server_name _;

    # Use linux sendfile syscall to speed up file transfers
    # and reduce mem & cpu usage
    sendfile            on;
    sendfile_max_chunk  1m;

    # Enable tcp_nopush to optimize network performance
    tcp_nopush          on;

    root /usr/share/nginx/html/;

    location / {
        # Try to serve pre-compressed file first, then fall back to regular file
        # to reduce mem & cpu usage
        gzip_static     on;
        gzip_comp_level 69;
    }
}

Docker image​

Create a file named Dockerfile with the following content and make sure to pre-compress all static files with gzip:

Dockerfile
FROM nginx:latest

# Our custom nginx config file
COPY ./nginx.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf

# Our static website
COPY ./index.html /usr/share/nginx/html/index.html

# Compress all build files with gzip
# But keep original files as well
RUN find . -type f -exec gzip -9 -k \{\} \;

Deployment​

Now that everything is setup, we can deploy our app, check the deployment and then remove it.

Deployment configuration​

Create a file named nginx-custom-dockerfile.lttle.yaml with the following content:

nginx-custom-dockerfile.lttle.yaml
app:
  name: nginx-custom-dockerfile
  namespace: samples
  build:
    docker:
      dockerfile: dockerfile
      context: .
  resources:
    # Nginx is very lightweight, so we can use minimal resources
    # Make sure to allocate enough cpu and memory for your static site(s) needs
    cpu: 1
    memory: 64
  expose:
    # We expose a public HTTPS endpoint that
    # proxies to the Nginx server on port 80
    public:
      # When there are no more active connections to our service
      # It will be safe to snapshot & sleep our machine
      connection-tracking: connection-aware
      port: 80
      external:
        protocol: https
  mode:
    flash:
      strategy:
        # We snapshot and save the state of the container
        # After it has listened on port 80
        listen-on-port: 80

Deploying​

To deploy the application, run the following command in the directory where you created the nginx.lttle.yaml file:

lttle deploy nginx-custom-dockerfile.lttle.yaml
Building and pushing image for samples/nginx-custom-dockerfile
Built image eu.registry.lttle.cloud/your-tenant/f6a1db28-2d0a-4a09-bf0e-915970223be6:latest
Pushing image eu.registry.lttle.cloud/your-tenant/f6a1db28-2d0a-4a09-bf0e-915970223be6:latest
Pushed image for samples/nginx-custom-dockerfile → eu.registry.lttle.cloud/your-tenant/f6a1db28-2d0a-4a09-bf0e-915970223be6:latest
Successfully deployed app: samples/nginx-custom-dockerfile

Checking the deployment​

After the deployment is complete, you can check the status of your application by running:

lttle app get --ns samples nginx-custom-dockerfile
               name: nginx-custom-dockerfile
          namespace: samples
               mode: flash
  snapshot strategy: listen on port 80
    suspend timeout: 10s
              image: eu.registry.lttle.cloud/your-tenant/f6a1db28-2d0a-4a09-bf0e-915970223be6:latest
               cpus: 1
             memory: 64 MiB
           services: public: https://nginx-custom-dockerfile--samples--public--your-tenant.eu.lttle.host → :80

If you want to see it live, you can

Checking the logs​

You can view the logs of your application by running:

lttle app logs --ns samples nginx-custom-dockerfile -f
/docker-entrypoint.sh: /docker-entrypoint.d/ is not empty, will attempt to perform configuration
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Looking for shell scripts in /docker-entrypoint.d/\
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/10-listen-on-ipv6-by-default.sh
10-listen-on-ipv6-by-default.sh: info: Getting the checksum of /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf
10-listen-on-ipv6-by-default.sh: info: /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf differs from the packaged version
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Ignoring /docker-entrypoint.d/10-listen-on-ipv6-by-default.sh.gz
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Sourcing /docker-entrypoint.d/15-local-resolvers.envsh
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Ignoring /docker-entrypoint.d/15-local-resolvers.envsh.gz
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/20-envsubst-on-templates.sh
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Ignoring /docker-entrypoint.d/20-envsubst-on-templates.sh.gz
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/30-tune-worker-processes.sh
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Ignoring /docker-entrypoint.d/30-tune-worker-processes.sh.gz
/docker-entrypoint.sh: Configuration complete; ready for start up
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: using the "epoll" event method
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: nginx/1.29.2
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: built by gcc 14.2.0 (Debian 14.2.0-19)
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: OS: Linux 6.1.0+
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: getrlimit(RLIMIT_NOFILE): 1024:4096
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: start worker processes
2025/10/11 17:38:32 [notice] 1#1: start worker process 23

Removing the deployment​

lttle app delete --ns samples nginx-custom-dockerfile -y
App 'nginx-custom-dockerfile' has been deleted.

Recommendations​

Do not use Nginx for:

  • Reverse proxying
  • Load balancing
  • Rate limiting

Instead, use services provided by lttle.cloud for these functionalities. They have been optimized for serverless environments and will provide better performance and reliability.