NginX GeoIP cause extra load

try_files should be what you want.

Something like this:

try_files $uri.html $uri $uri/ =404;

After a lot of trial and error, this is the configuration that would work and perform as expected.

The problem with my previous version was double:

• Nginx rewrites outside locations were messy and they would just refuse to work by creating nasty loops

• Nginx was checking the existence of a cookie which is set by a php application behind nginx. Thanks to @AlexeyTen for pointing this out. Setting an extra cookie conditionally with nginx did the trick

  map $geoip2_data_country_code $country_url {
       default example.com; ##This is the US version
       GB      example.com/uk;
       CA      example.com/ca;
  }
  
  server {
      listen 443 ssl spdy default_server;
      server_name example.com;
      root /var/www/html;
  
      location / {
          try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$args; 
          if ($http_cookie !~ "country=set") {                            
              add_header Set-Cookie "country=set;Max-Age=31536000";
              rewrite ^ $scheme://$country_url$request_uri break;
              }
      }
  
      location /uk {
          try_files $uri $uri/ /uk/index.php?$args;  
          if ($http_cookie !~ "country=set") {                            
              add_header Set-Cookie "country=set;Max-Age=31536000";
              rewrite ^ $scheme://$country_url$request_uri break;
              } 
      }
  
      location /ca {  
          try_files $uri $uri/ /ca/index.php?$args;   
          if ($http_cookie !~ "country=set") {                            
              add_header Set-Cookie "country=set;Max-Age=31536000";
              rewrite ^ $scheme://$country_url$request_uri break;
              }
      }
  
      ##Other locations
      }