Today we are excited to announce a new way to provision different types of servers within Laravel Forge. When creating a Forge server, you will now have your choice of six different server types: App Server, Web Server, Worker Server, Database Server and Cache Server. Of course, you may still provision a load balancer as well. We'll discuss each of the server types below.
App Server
Application servers include everything you need to deploy your PHP / Laravel application, including a cache (Redis / Memcached) and a database. These are the servers that we have always offered as the default server type within Laravel Forge. Application servers include:
- PHP
- Nginx
- MySQL / Postgres / MariaDB (if desired)
- Cache (Redis + Memcached)
- Node.js
Web Server
Web servers include the web server software you need to deploy your PHP / Laravel application, but do not include a cache or database. These servers are meant to be networked to dedicated cache or database servers. Web servers include:
- PHP
- Nginx
- Node.js
Database Servers
Database servers include MySQL, Postgres, or MariaDB, but do not include a web server. Database servers are meant to be networked to your web servers.
Cache Servers
Cache servers will only install Redis and Memcached. These servers are meant to be networked to your web servers.
Worker Servers
Worker servers install PHP, but do not install a web server or database. These servers are meant to serve as dedicated queue worker servers that are networked to your web servers.
Load Balancer
Load Balancers continue to be provisioned with only Nginx installed. These servers distribute incoming web traffic to your web or application servers.
If you don’t have a Forge account, now is a great time to sign up! Forge allows you to painlessly create and manage PHP servers which include MySQL, Redis, Memcached, database backups, and everything else you need to run robust, modern Laravel applications.
