The Complete Guide to Nginx Proxy Manager: The Ultimate 🚀 Web Proxy Management Tool

🔍 What is Nginx Proxy Manager?

Nginx Proxy Manager (NPM) is an open-source web proxy management tool based on Nginx that allows you to manage complex reverse proxy settings with a simple web UI.

• Main purpose: HTTPS reverse proxy for multiple domains/services, automate SSL certificate issuance/renewal
• Benefits: Can be deployed in 5 minutes based on Docker containers without CLI commands ⚡️

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✨ Core Features

1. Intuitive web dashboard.

   • Manage proxy hosts, SSL, access control visualization (Source: official documentation).

2. Let’s Encrypt integration.

   • Issue/automatically renew SSL certificates with one click 🔒.

     graph LR
     A[Enter domain] --> B[Select Let's Encrypt]
     B --> C [Register email]
     C --> D[Apply HTTPS automatically]

3. Advanced proxy features.

   • Custom location settings (e.g. your.com/blog → WordPress server)
   • Websockets, HTTP/2 support
   • IP-based access control (white/blacklist)

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🛠 Installation Guide (based on Docker)

**Prerequisite: Docker, Docker Compose installed

1. Create docker-compose.yml file:

   version: '3'
   services:
   app:
   image: 'jc21/nginx-proxy-manager:latest'
   ports:
     - '80:80'
     - '443:443'
     - '81:81' # management ports
   volumes:
     - ./data:/data
     - ./letsencrypt:/etc/letsencrypt

2. run the service:

   docker-compose up -d

3. connect to: http://서버IP:81

   • Initial login: admin@example.com / changeme

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⚙️ Follow the default settings

📌 Add a proxy host

1. Hosts → Proxy Hosts → Add Proxy Host
2. Required fields:
   • Domain Names: your-domain.com
   • Scheme: http or https
   • Forward Hostname/IP: Internal Server IP (for example, 192.168.1.100)
   • Forward Port: 8080

🔐 Apply SSL

1. click SSL tab → select Let’s Encrypt.
2. enter your email → Save → Certificate is automatically issued and HTTPS enforcement is enabled!

🛡️ Access control (e.g. limit admin pages)

1. go to Access Lists → Add Access List
2. Set enforcement rules:
   • Satisfy any: All must pass.
   • Add rule: IP Address = UserIP (enter the allowed IP)
3. edit proxy host → select the rule you created in the Access List tab

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🧰 Advanced Utilization Tips

🔄 Multi-Application Integration.

• Path-based routing**: service1.your.com → ServerA:3000 service2.your.com/blog → ServerB:8080

📊 Monitoring setup

Prometheus + Grafana integration:

# add docker-compose.yml
environment:
  ENABLE_METRICS: 'true' # Exposing data to http://npm:81/metrics.

🚨 Check live logs

docker logs -f [containerID] # Required in case of errors!

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❌ Troubleshooting typical issues

1. 502 Bad Gateway

   • Verify that the target server is running: curl http://내부서버IP:포트
   • Check firewall: ufw allow 8080 (on Ubuntu)

2. **SSL certificate renewal failed

   • Make sure port 80/443 is open (requires Let’s Encrypt authentication)
   • Volume permissions: chown -R 1000:1000 ./letsencrypt

3. Domain not reachable Check DNS settings

   • Check DNS settings: dig your-domain.com
   • Test hosts file: add serverIP your-domain.com locally

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✅ Conclusion: Why NPM?

> 💡 Suitable users: > – Home lab/small service operators. > – Need a lighter solution than Kubernetes Ingress > – Don’t want to waste time on SSL, domain management!

**Get started with one line of Docker commands right now!

mkdir npm && cd npm && nano docker-compose.yml # Paste the above configuration and run!