Nginx – How to forward non-http requests on port 80 to another port

nginxport-forwardingstream

There is an nginx web server listening to both 80 and 443 ports. I would like to process all the http requests as usual and forward all the non-http requests to another port (say, 1234).

My question is very similar to one already answered on stackoverflow: Is it possible to forward NON-http connecting request to some other port in nginx?. Perhaps, I misunderstand the most up-voted answer, but when I add something like this to nginx.conf:

stream {
    upstream backend {
        server example.com:1234;
    }

    server {
        listen 80;
        proxy_pass backend;
    }
}

I get the (expected) bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use) error.

Best Answer

nginx can only provide one kind of a service to a port at the same time.

So, this configuration will work:

http {
    server {
        listen 80;

        server_name example.com;
        ...
    }
}

stream {
    server {
        listen 81;
        proxy_pass backend;
    }

    upstream backend {
        server 127.0.0.1:12345;
    }
}

You cannot use the same port on stream and http blocks, since nginx has no way of distinguishing the traffic type.

Correct way in new versions of nginx

Turn out my first answer to this question was correct at certain time, but it turned into another pitfall - to stay up to date please check Taxing rewrite pitfalls

I have been corrected by many SE users, so the credit goes to them, but more importantly, here is the correct code:

server {
       listen         80;
       server_name    my.domain.com;
       return         301 https://$server_name$request_uri;
}

server {
       listen         443 ssl;
       server_name    my.domain.com;
       # add Strict-Transport-Security to prevent man in the middle attacks
       add_header Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000" always; 

       [....]
}

Nginx Configuration – Front-End Reverse Proxy to Another Port

I'm assuming that nginx is not the server listening on port 5010 as well as 80, correct? Something else is listening on 5010 and you wish to have nginx proxy to that server?

If that's the case, here's a nice sample config I've used in the past with success:

server {
        listen       80;
        server_name  <YOUR_HOSTNAME>;
        location / {
            proxy_pass         http://127.0.0.1:5010/;
            proxy_redirect     off;

            proxy_set_header   Host             $host;
            proxy_set_header   X-Real-IP        $remote_addr;
            proxy_set_header   X-Forwarded-For  $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;

            client_max_body_size       10m;
            client_body_buffer_size    128k;

            proxy_connect_timeout      90;
            proxy_send_timeout         90;
            proxy_read_timeout         90;

            proxy_buffer_size          4k;
            proxy_buffers              4 32k;
            proxy_busy_buffers_size    64k;
            proxy_temp_file_write_size 64k;
        }
}

I believe that should accomplish what you're seeking. Good luck!

Best Answer

Related Solutions

NGINX Redirect – How to Rewrite All HTTP Requests to HTTPS While Maintaining Sub-Domain

Correct way in new versions of nginx

Nginx Configuration – Front-End Reverse Proxy to Another Port

Related Topic