How to Set Up a Load Balancer with Nginx

Nginx load balancing distributes traffic across multiple backend servers — providing horizontal scaling and automatic failover.

Configuration

upstream backend {
    server web1.yourdomain.com:8080 weight=3;
    server web2.yourdomain.com:8080 weight=2;
    server web3.yourdomain.com:8080 backup;
}
server {
    listen 80;
    location / { proxy_pass http://backend; }
}

Load Balancing Methods

# Least connections
upstream backend { least_conn; server web1; server web2; }
# IP hash (sticky sessions)
upstream backend { ip_hash; server web1; server web2; }

Health Checks

server web1 max_fails=3 fail_timeout=30s;

Conclusion

Nginx load balancing enables horizontal scaling. Our team designs load-balanced server architectures for high-traffic applications.