How to Fix Common Nginx Web Server Errors

Nginx is a very popular web server these days. This article will show you some common errors when running an Nginx web server and possible solutions. This is not a complete list. If you still can’t fix the error after trying the advised solutions, please check your Nginx server logs under /var/log/nginx/ directory and search on Google to debug the problem.

Unable to connect/Refused to Connect

If you see the following error when trying to access your website:

Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server at www.example.com

or

www.example.com refused to connect

It could be that

1. Nginx isn’t running. You can check Nginx status with sudo systemctl status nginx. Start Nginx with sudo systemctl start nginx. If Nginx fails to start, run sudo nginx -t to find if there is anything wrong with your configuration file. And check the journal (sudo jounalctl -eu nginx) to find out why it fails to start.
2. Firewall blocking ports 80 and 443. If you use the UFW firewall on Debian/Ubuntu, run sudo ufw allow 80,443/tcp to open TCP ports 80 and 443. If you use Firewalld on RHEL/CentOS/Rocky Linux/AlmaLinux, run sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service={http,https}, then sudo systemctl reload firewalld to open TCP ports 80 and 443.

Read full tutorial here: https://www.linuxbabe.com/linux-server/how-to-fix-common-nginx-errors