How to Install LiteSpeed Web Server on Ubuntu

LiteSpeed Web Server is the fastest commercially available web server, delivering up to 9x better performance than Apache while maintaining full .htaccess compatibility. This guide covers installation on Ubuntu.

Prerequisites

• Ubuntu 18.04 or 20.04 server
• LiteSpeed licence (trial available at litespeedtech.com)
• Root or sudo access

Step 1 — Download LiteSpeed

cd /tmp
wget https://www.litespeedtech.com/packages/4.0/lsws-4.2.x-ent-x86_64-linux.tar.gz
tar -xzf lsws-*.tar.gz
cd lsws-*

Step 2 — Run Installer

sudo ./install.sh

Follow the prompts — set admin password, port (default 8088) and licence key.

Step 3 — Access WebAdmin

https://your-server-ip:7080

Login with the admin credentials you set during installation.

Step 4 — Configure Virtual Host

WebAdmin → Virtual Hosts → Add → enter document root and domain

Step 5 — Configure PHP via LSAPI

# Install PHP
sudo apt install php8.0-fpm -y

# LiteSpeed uses LSAPI for PHP — faster than FastCGI
# WebAdmin → Server Configuration → External App → Add LSAPI app

Step 6 — Enable SSL

# Get Let's Encrypt certificate
sudo certbot certonly --webroot -w /var/www/html -d yourdomain.com

# Configure in WebAdmin → Listeners → Add SSL listener
# Point to certbot certificates

Step 7 — Start LiteSpeed

sudo /usr/local/lsws/bin/lswsctrl start
sudo /usr/local/lsws/bin/lswsctrl status

Performance Comparison

# Benchmark with Apache Bench
ab -n 10000 -c 100 http://yourdomain.com/

# LiteSpeed typically shows:
# Apache:    1,200 req/sec
# LiteSpeed: 10,800 req/sec (9x faster)

Conclusion

LiteSpeed Enterprise delivers unmatched performance for high-traffic sites. Our team provides LiteSpeed server management and optimisation.