Least connections in Nginx - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Load Balancing with Least Connections in Nginx

📖 Scenario: You are setting up a simple web server environment where multiple backend servers handle user requests. To make sure the traffic is distributed efficiently, you want to use the least connections method in Nginx. This method sends new requests to the server with the fewest active connections, helping balance the load better.

🎯 Goal: Build an Nginx configuration that uses the least_conn load balancing method to distribute requests between two backend servers.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an upstream block named backend with two servers: server1.example.com and server2.example.com

Configure the upstream block to use the least_conn load balancing method

Set up a server block that listens on port 80 and proxies requests to the backend upstream

Add a location / block inside the server block to proxy pass requests

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Web applications often run on multiple servers to handle many users. Using least connections load balancing helps keep the servers from getting overloaded by sending new users to the least busy server.

💼 Career

DevOps engineers and system administrators configure load balancers like Nginx to ensure high availability and performance of web services.

1

Create the upstream block with backend servers

Create an upstream block named backend with these two servers exactly: server1.example.com and server2.example.com.

Nginx

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the upstream directive to group backend servers.

2

Add least connections load balancing method

Modify the upstream backend block to use the least_conn load balancing method by adding least_conn; inside the block.

Nginx

upstream backend {
    server server1.example.com;
    server server2.example.com;
    # Add least_conn load balancing method here
}

Need a hint?

Place least_conn; as the first line inside the upstream block.

3

Create server block to listen on port 80 and proxy requests

Create a server block that listens on port 80 and contains a location / block that proxies requests to http://backend using proxy_pass.

Nginx

upstream backend {
    least_conn;
    server server1.example.com;
    server server2.example.com;
}

# Add server block below

Need a hint?

Use listen 80; inside the server block and proxy_pass http://backend; inside the location / block.

4

Output the complete Nginx configuration

Print the complete Nginx configuration including the upstream backend block with least_conn and the server block that proxies requests.

Nginx

# Print the full configuration below

Need a hint?

Output the entire configuration exactly as built in previous steps.