Nginx Location Block Configurator
Free online Nginx Location Block Configurator that runs directly in your browser.
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Other tools you may find usefulNginx location block configurator - the heart of the web server configuration
The Nginx server is one of the most popular and efficient solutions for serving websites, serving as an HTTP server, reverse proxy and load balancer. The most important element of site configuration in Nginx is thelocationblock. It determines how the server should respond to queries directed to specific URI (Universal Resource Identifier) addresses. It is inside the location block that we define redirections, serving static files, cache headers (cache control), gzip compression, security and forwarding traffic to PHP interpreters (e.g. PHP-FPM) or Node.js application servers.
Our professional tool is the free Nginx location block generator and configurator. It allows you to visually click complex routing rules without having to remember difficult Nginx syntax. Just select the match type, provide the URI path and select the desired options (e.g. proxy_pass, security headers, rewrite rules). The tool will generate a fully valid configuration file ready to be pasted into the configuration file in the/etc/nginx/sites-available/.
Nginx location matching modifiers and their priorities
Nginx matches queries to location blocks based on modifiers that define how strings are compared. The order in which rules are checked does not depend solely on the order in which they are written in the file, which is a common source of errors:
| Modifier | Match Type | Checking priority | Example of an entry in the configuration | Practical application |
|---|---|---|---|---|
= |
Exact match | 1 (Highest - stop search immediately) | location = /favicon.ico { ... } |
Serving single, frequently requested files (e.g. robots.txt). |
^~ |
Longest prefix without regular expressions | 2 (Stops regex rule search) | location ^~ /images/ { ... } |
Block regular expression checking for static folders. |
~ |
Regular expression - case-sensitive regex | 3 (Checked in the order of writing to the file) | location ~ \.(jpg|png|gif)$ { ... } |
Configuration of cache headers for images with specific extensions. |
~* |
Regular expression – case-insensitive regex | 3 (Checked in the order of writing to the file) | location ~* \.php$ { ... } |
Passing all PHP queries to the PHP-FPM interpreter. |
| No modifier | Prefix match | 4 (Lowest - selected only when there are no other matches) | location /blog/ { ... } |
Default traffic routing for entire subdirectories of the website. |
The most popular directives used inside the location block
The location block allows you to control the server's behavior using a set of directives. Here are the most important ones:
root/alias:They define the physical path in the operating system where the website files are located.rootappends the URI to the root path, whilealiasreplaces it completely.try_files:A key routing directive (especially for frameworks such as Laravel or WordPress). Checks for the existence of a physical file or folder on disk, and if not, directs traffic to the specified file (e.g./index.php?$query_string).proxy_pass:Basic reverse proxy configuration directive. Forwards the query to another server (e.g. a locally running Node.js application on port 3000:http://127.0.0.1:3000).