How to Deploy Nginx via Docker Container on Linode

Nginx remains one of the most widely used and adaptable web servers around, frequently used for its reverse proxy and load balancer capabilities. With Docker, you can deploy your own Nginx server with a reduced administrative overhead. The portability and self-contained nature of Docker containers can make running and maintaining an Nginx server easier, and lead into scalable options like Kubernetes.

Follow along with this tutorial to learn about the advantages of running Nginx via a Docker container and how to do that yourself.

Before You Begin

1. If you have not already done so, create a Linode account and Compute Instance. See our Getting Started with Linode and Creating a Compute Instance guides.

2. Follow our Setting Up and Securing a Compute Instance guide to update your system. You may also wish to set the timezone, configure your hostname, create a limited user account, and harden SSH access.

Getting Started with Docker

Docker is an open source platform for creating standalone, portable application containers. A Docker container operates with its own runtime environment and everything the containerized application needs. It thus provides a self-contained and portable solution that is more efficient than virtual hosting.

Docker containers also have the advantage of container orchestration. Platforms like Kubernetes can leverage the portability and self-contained nature of Docker containers to efficiently deploy applications to clusters.

Read more about Docker, its advantages, and its use cases in our guide When and Why to Use Docker. Learn about using Docker with Kubernetes container orchestration in our guide on how to Manage a Docker Cluster with Kubernetes.

Why Run Nginx in a Docker Container?

Running Nginx via a Docker container can serve a range of use cases. Most of the advantage lies in running Nginx in an easy-to-manage and self-contained environment. Should you need to update your Nginx instance or to install a new version, the process is as simple as replacing your existing container. At the same time, using Docker minimizes the clutter of dependency files and software on your host system.

Beyond this, a Dockerized Nginx instance can be a gateway to more complicated setups. It allows you to test out particular Nginx container configurations before deploying them as part of a wider infrastructure, such as a Kubernetes deployment.

Installing Docker

To install Docker, follow the instructions in our guide on Installing and Using Docker. Use the drop down at the top of the guide to select the appropriate distribution. The present tutorial assumes that you have followed the sections on:

• Installing Docker Engine
• Starting and Testing Docker
• Using Docker with a Non-Root User

Deploying Nginx as a Docker Container

With Docker installed, you’re ready to start up an Nginx container. This section of the tutorial walks through the steps to get a basic Nginx server up and running in a Docker container.

Continue on to the next section to advance your Nginx container instance with custom configurations and content to serve.

Starting the Nginx Container

The standard method for deploying simple Nginx server within a Docker container uses Docker’s run command. This command pulls the latest Nginx Docker image and starts running it immediately within a new container.

docker run --name nginx-docker -p 80:80 -d nginx

This example command includes several useful options for effectively leveraging your Nginx container:

• --name allows you to name the container, here as nginx-docker.
• -p defines a port mapping, with the container’s port 80 mapped to the host machine’s port 80.
• -d runs the container in detached mode, meaning that the container continues to run in the background until stopped.

Unable to find image 'nginx:latest' locally
latest: Pulling from library/nginx
52d2b7f179e3: Pull complete
fd9f026c6310: Pull complete
055fa98b4363: Pull complete
96576293dd29: Pull complete
a7c4092be904: Pull complete
e3b6889c8954: Pull complete
da761d9a302b: Pull complete
Digest: sha256:104c7c5c54f2685f0f46f3be607ce60da7085da3eaa5ad22d3d9f01594295e9c
Status: Downloaded newer image for nginx:latest
b39a20f24545fdf66218a1f7afa6b3643fd85a58bc1460f383972004dfd67811

Connecting to the Nginx Server

The Nginx container now runs a working Nginx server on your system. Because the command above mapped the container’s Nginx port to your system’s port 80, you can see the Nginx output there.

Open a Web browser and navigate to your system’s public IP address. For example, if you IP address is 192.0.2.0, navigate to http://192.0.2.0. You should see the Nginx welcome page:

Jump ahead to the section on Applying Custom Nginx Configurations to take the next step in running your own website through the Nginx container.

Managing the Nginx Container

The Docker command used above to start up Nginx runs the container in the background. When you are ready to stop the container, you can do so with a Docker stop command and the container’s name.

Using the name in the example above, the command to stop the container is:

docker stop nginx-docker

This does not remove the container, and you can start the container again using the Docker start command. Again, here is an example using the container name given above:

docker start nginx-docker

Should you want to remove the container altogether, you can use the Docker rm command with the container name, as in the following example. Doing so is useful to free resources when you no longer need the container or when you want to start fresh.

docker rm nginx-docker

Applying Custom Nginx Configurations

The above gets Nginx running within a Docker container, but you need to have Nginx serve your content. Not only that, but you may want to run a custom Nginx configuration.

Docker provides a few ways to get the content and configurations you need for your Nginx server. Each of the sections below cover a different method, from the easier and ready-to-go to the more complicated and adaptable.

Before taking up either method, you should stop and remove your existing Nginx Docker container if you created one following the steps above:

docker stop nginx-docker
docker rm nginx-docker

Mounting Configuration and Content Files

Docker includes a -v option to mount directories from your host system into the container. This provides the simplest solution for customizing Nginx to your needs.

This example walks through creating a simple website and Nginx configuration and deploying them to a new Nginx Docker container.

1. Make a directory for your Nginx content and configuration, change into that directory:

   mkdir ~/example-nginx-site
   cd ~/example-nginx-site

2. From there, create an nginx-default.conf file:

   nano nginx-default.conf

3. You can give the nginx-default.conf file whatever contents you want for your Nginx configuration. Below is a bare-bones version of a default Nginx static server configuration:

   File: nginx-default.conf

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   server { listen 80; listen [::]:80; server_name localhost; location / { root /usr/share/nginx/html; index index.html index.htm; } error_page 500 502 503 504 /50x.html; location = /50x.html { root /usr/share/nginx/html; } }

4. When done, press CTRL+X, followed by Y then Enter to save the file and exit nano.

5. Create an html subdirectory to use for storing your website content.

   mkdir html

6. Add files for your desired website into the html directory. Following the configuration above, the directory should have an index.html file, so create it:

   nano html/index.html

7. This example index.html file provides a basic webpage:

   File: html/index.html

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   <!doctype html> <html lang="en"> <head> <meta charset="utf-8"> <title>Example Nginx Website</title> </head> <body> <h1>An Example Nginx Website</h1> <p>Welcome to your own Nginx website!</p> </body> </html>

8. When done, press CTRL+X, followed by Y then Enter to save the file and exit nano.

9. Start up an Nginx Docker container with additional options to mount the custom configuration file and website content.

   docker run --name nginx-docker -p 80:80 -d -v ~/example-nginx-site/nginx-default.conf:/etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf -v ~/example-nginx-site/html:/usr/share/nginx/html nginx

   The run command here remains similar to the one demonstrated further above. However, this time two -v options are included:

   • The first mounts your custom configuration file (nginx-default.conf) to the container’s location for the default Nginx configuration file. This overwrites the container’s default Nginx configuration file with your own.

   • The second mounts your custom website content (from the html subdirectory) to the directory in the container where Nginx looks for web content (/usr/share/nginx/html).

Open a Web browser and navigate to your system’s public IP address once again. You should now find your custom webpage:

Custom Image Deployment

The method above for including configurations and content with your Nginx container works well for most use cases. However, you may find yourself needing more control or wanting a solution other than mounting.

At this point, you are probably best served creating your own Dockerfile for a custom Nginx image. All of the examples above use the default Nginx image, pulled from Docker Hub. Using a Dockerfile, you can build around the base Nginx image to create an image customized to your use case.

To begin, this example leverages the custom files created in the previous section. Follow the relevant steps there, and you should have an ~/example-nginx-site directory with the following structure:

example-nginx-site/
  |-html/
  |  |-index.html
  |-nginx-default.conf

From there, follow along with the steps below to create a simple Nginx Docker image. Essentially, this image behaves the same as the setup in the previous section. Following that model provides a relatively easy-to-read example and provides an effective basis for more complicated images.

1. Stop and remove any Docker container you created from the previous sections of the tutorial:

   docker stop nginx-docker
   docker rm nginx-docker

2. Change into the example-nginx-site directory if you are not already in it and create a file named Dockerfile:

   cd ~/example-nginx-site
   nano Dockerfile

3. Give the Dockerfile the contents shown here:

   File: Dockerfile

   1 2 3 4

   FROM nginx:latest RUN rm /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf COPY nginx-default.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf COPY html /usr/share/nginx/html

4. When done, press CTRL+X, followed by Y then Enter to save the file and exit nano.

5. Use the Docker build command to build an image from the Dockerfile. This example gives the image the name nginx-docker-image.

   docker build -t nginx-docker-image .

   [+] Building 0.3s (9/9) FINISHED                                 docker:default
    => [internal] load .dockerignore                                          0.0s
    => => transferring context: 2B                                            0.0s
    => [internal] load build definition from Dockerfile                       0.0s
    => => transferring dockerfile: 182B                                       0.0s
    => [internal] load metadata for docker.io/library/nginx:latest            0.0s
    => [1/4] FROM docker.io/library/nginx:latest                              0.0s
    => [internal] load build context                                          0.0s
    => => transferring context: 618B                                          0.0s
    => [2/4] RUN rm /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf                            0.2s
    => [3/4] COPY nginx-default.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf           0.0s
    => [4/4] COPY html /usr/share/nginx/html                                  0.0s
    => exporting to image                                                     0.0s
    => => exporting layers                                                    0.0s
    => => writing image sha256:ceaa49bca8f20e1ea684a286ada3819cc69150eb40ef3  0.0s
    => => naming to docker.io/library/nginx-docker-image                      0.0s

6. Run the new Docker image. The command for doing so is almost exactly the same command for running the default Nginx image, except here you provide your custom image’s name rather than nginx.

   docker run --name nginx-docker -p 80:80 -d nginx-docker-image

Once again, you should be able to navigate to your system’s public IP address in a Web browser to see your custom website.

To move ahead with more advanced Dockerfile setups, take a look at our guide How to Use a Dockerfile to Build a Docker Image. There, you can find a thorough overview of Dockerfile creation and usage.

Conclusion

Nginx pairs perfectly with Docker’s containerization. You now have your own setup, ready for configuration and deployment to meet your server needs. Take a look at the resources linked throughout this tutorial to expand your learning and get even more out of your new setup.

More Information

You may wish to consult the following resources for additional information on this topic. While these are provided in the hope that they will be useful, please note that we cannot vouch for the accuracy or timeliness of externally hosted materials.

• Nginx: Deploying NGINX and NGINX Plus with Docker