Lesson 47 • Advanced

Deploying PHP Apps 🚀

Deploy PHP applications with Nginx, PHP-FPM, and Docker — including production Nginx configs, FPM tuning, and zero-downtime deployments.

What You'll Learn in This Lesson

• Configure Nginx as a reverse proxy for PHP-FPM
• Tune PHP-FPM worker pools for production traffic
• Build multi-stage Docker images for PHP apps
• Set up docker-compose with MySQL and Redis
• Deploy with zero downtime using rolling updates

Note: PHP runs on a server. Our examples simulate PHP logic using JavaScript. To run real PHP, install PHP.

🎯 Real-World Analogy: Deploying a PHP app is like opening a restaurant. Nginx is the front-of-house host (receives customers, serves menus). PHP-FPM is the kitchen (cooks prepare food/responses). Docker is a food truck — the entire restaurant packed into a portable container you can deploy anywhere identically.

Nginx + PHP-FPM

Nginx serves static files (CSS, JS, images) directly — no PHP needed. For .php files, it forwards the request to PHP-FPM via a Unix socket. FPM maintains a pool of worker processes that handle requests in parallel, with configurable limits to match your server's RAM.

Try It: Nginx & FPM Config

Write production Nginx config and tune PHP-FPM worker pools

Try it Yourself »

JavaScript

// Nginx + PHP-FPM Deployment
console.log("=== PHP Deployment Stack ===");
console.log();
console.log("  Client → Nginx (web server) → PHP-FPM (PHP processor) → Your App");
console.log();
console.log("  Nginx: Serves static files, proxies PHP requests to FPM");
console.log("  PHP-FPM: Pool of PHP worker processes, handles requests in parallel");
console.log("  OPcache: Caches compiled PHP opcodes for speed");
console.log();

// Simulate Nginx config
console.log("=== Nginx Configuration ===");
co
...

Docker Deployment

Docker packages your app, PHP version, extensions, and config into a single image. Multi-stage builds keep images small (install Composer deps in one stage, copy to a lean production image). Docker Compose orchestrates your app, database, and cache as a single stack.

Try It: Docker & Compose

Build a multi-stage Dockerfile and docker-compose.yml for PHP

Try it Yourself »

JavaScript

// Docker Deployment for PHP
console.log("=== Why Docker for PHP? ===");
console.log();
console.log("  ✅ Same environment everywhere (dev = staging = prod)");
console.log("  ✅ Easy to scale (run more containers)");
console.log("  ✅ Isolated dependencies (PHP 8.3 + extensions)");
console.log("  ✅ Infrastructure as code (Dockerfile in git)");
console.log();

// Simulate Dockerfile
console.log("=== Dockerfile (Multi-Stage Build) ===");
console.log();
let dockerfile = [
  "# Stage 1: Install depende
...

⚠️ Common Mistakes

⚠️

Exposing .env files — Your Nginx config must block access to .env, .git, and other sensitive files. Use location ~ /\. { deny all; }.

⚠️

Running as root in Docker — Always set USER www-data in your Dockerfile. Running PHP as root is a major security risk.

💡

Pro Tip: Use a .dockerignore file to exclude vendor/, .git/, and node_modules/ from the Docker build context — it makes builds 10x faster.

📋 Quick Reference — Deployment

Tool	Purpose
Nginx	Web server, reverse proxy, static files
PHP-FPM	FastCGI process manager for PHP
Docker	Containerized deployment
docker-compose	Multi-container orchestration
Let's Encrypt	Free SSL certificates (certbot)

🎉 Lesson Complete!

You can now deploy PHP apps to production! Next, learn to architect complete PHP applications as modular monoliths.