Deploy LiteSpeed Web Server as an Nginx Alternative

LiteSpeed Web Server is a high-performance, drop-in replacement for Apache that also competes with Nginx. OpenLiteSpeed (the open-source edition) offers HTTP/3, built-in caching, and native PHP support via LSAPI. This guide covers deploying OpenLiteSpeed on your VPS as an alternative to Nginx.

Install OpenLiteSpeed

# One-line installer
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/litespeedtech/ols1clk/master/ols1clk.sh
sudo bash ols1clk.sh --lsphp 83  # Install with PHP 8.3

# Or manual installation
sudo wget -O - https://repo.litespeed.sh | sudo bash
sudo apt install openlitespeed lsphp83 lsphp83-common lsphp83-mysql \
    lsphp83-curl lsphp83-imagick lsphp83-imap lsphp83-intl

# Start OpenLiteSpeed
sudo systemctl start lsws
sudo systemctl enable lsws

# Default ports:
# Web: port 8088
# Admin panel: port 7080

# Set admin password
sudo /usr/local/lsws/admin/misc/admpass.sh

Configure Virtual Hosts

# Via web admin panel (https://your-ip:7080)
# Or edit configuration files directly

# /usr/local/lsws/conf/httpd_config.conf
listener Default {
    address     *:80
    secure      0
}

listener SSL {
    address     *:443
    secure      1
    keyFile     /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem
    certFile    /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem
}

virtualHost example.com {
    vhRoot      /var/www/example.com
    configFile  conf/vhosts/example.com/vhconf.conf
    allowSymbolLink 1
    enableScript 1
}

# /usr/local/lsws/conf/vhosts/example.com/vhconf.conf
docRoot         $VH_ROOT/html/
enableGzip      1
enableBr        1

context / {
    location    $VH_ROOT/html/
    allowBrowse 1
    rewrite {
        enable  1
        rules