How to Install OpenLiteSpeed on Ubuntu 20.04

OpenLiteSpeed is the free, open-source version of LiteSpeed Web Server. It delivers exceptional performance and is fully supported on Ubuntu 20.04.

Step 1 — Add OpenLiteSpeed Repository

sudo wget -O - https://repo.litespeed.sh | sudo bash
sudo apt update

Step 2 — Install OpenLiteSpeed

sudo apt install openlitespeed -y

Step 3 — Install PHP with LSPHP

# LiteSpeed uses LSPHP — optimised PHP for LiteSpeed
sudo apt install lsphp80 lsphp80-mysql lsphp80-curl lsphp80-json lsphp80-mbstring -y

Step 4 — Set Admin Password

sudo /usr/local/lsws/admin/misc/admpass.sh

Step 5 — Start OpenLiteSpeed

sudo systemctl enable lsws --now
sudo systemctl status lsws

Step 6 — Access WebAdmin Console

http://your-server-ip:7080

Step 7 — Configure Virtual Host

WebAdmin → Virtual Hosts → View/Edit → configure document root, PHP version and domain mappings.

Step 8 — Open Firewall Ports

sudo ufw allow 80/tcp
sudo ufw allow 443/tcp
sudo ufw allow 7080/tcp  # WebAdmin (restrict to your IP)
sudo ufw reload

Step 9 — Test Performance

ab -n 5000 -c 50 http://your-server-ip/

# OpenLiteSpeed typically delivers:
# 3-5x better throughput than Apache
# Near-LiteSpeed Enterprise performance

Conclusion

OpenLiteSpeed is the best free web server for performance-focused deployments. Our team provides OpenLiteSpeed installation and management.