NGINX (pronounced “engine X”) was created by Igor Sysoev and was publicly released in October 2004. It was designed to solve the C10k problem, which is a limitation that traditional web servers (like Apache) faced in handling 10,000 concurrent connections. Sysoev initially developed it to meet the performance needs of the Rambler search engine in Russia, but it quickly gained popularity for its efficiency, lightweight architecture, and ability to handle high levels of traffic.
NGINX’s event-driven, asynchronous architecture allows it to handle multiple connections with minimal memory footprint and resource usage. This efficiency is why it became the go-to solution for high-traffic websites and for use as a reverse proxy and load balancer.
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 2002 | Igor Sysoev begins development of NGINX |
| 2004 | First public release (October 4, version 0.1.0) |
| 2008 | NGINX serves 500 million requests/day for Rambler |
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 2011 | NGINX, Inc. founded by Igor Sysoev and Maxim Konovalov (July) |
| 2011 | $3M Series A funding (BV Capital, Runa Capital, MSD Capital) |
| 2012 | Commercial support launched (February) |
| 2012 | OpenBSD 5.2 includes NGINX in base system (November) |
| 2013 | NGINX Plus subscription released (August) |
| 2013 | $10M Series B funding (led by NEA, October) |
| 2014 | $20M Series B1 funding (December) |
| 2015 | NGINX overtakes Apache as most popular web server for top 1,000 busiest sites |
| 2016 | Dynamic module loading added (v1.9.11, February) |
| 2017 | NGINX Controller, Amplify, and Unit released |
| 2018 | gRPC support added (v1.13.10, March) |
| 2018 | $43M Series C funding (led by Goldman Sachs, June) |
| 2019 | F5 Networks acquires NGINX, Inc. for $670 million (March 11) |
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 2022 | Igor Sysoev leaves NGINX/F5 (January 18) |
| 2022 | Angie fork released by former NGINX developers (late 2022) |
| 2024 | freenginx fork created by core developer Maxim Dounin (February) |
| 2025 | NGINX Unit archived (October) |
| 2025 | Native ACME protocol support for TLS certificates (August-September) |
| 2026 | CVE-2026-1642 fixed in versions 1.28.2 and 1.29.5 (February 4) |
| 2026 | NGINX 1.29.6 released with sticky sessions support (March 10) |
| Version | Date | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| 0.1.0 | 2004-10-04 | First public release |
| 1.0.0 | 2011-04 | First stable release |
| 1.6.0 | 2014 | Enhanced security and HTTP/2 support |
| 1.8.0 | 2015 | Improved HTTP/2 support |
| 1.9.0 | 2015 | Added HTTP/2, stream processing, TCP load balancing |
| 1.9.11 | 2016-02 | Dynamic module loading |
| 1.11.0 | 2016 | Added gRPC and WebSockets support |
| 1.13.0 | 2017 | QUIC/HTTP3 support begins |
| 1.15.0 | 2018 | Enhanced HTTP/2 features |
| 1.17.0 | 2019 | Continued HTTP/3 development |
| 1.28.2 | 2026-02-04 | Stable: CVE-2026-1642 fix |
| 1.29.5 | 2026-02-04 | Mainline: CVE-2026-1642 fix |
| 1.29.6 | 2026-03-10 | Mainline: Sticky sessions support, additional fixes |
NGINX uses a semantic versioning system:
1.28.2)1.28.x)1.29.x)NGINX recommends using the mainline version for most users, as it is the most up-to-date, while stable versions are more conservative and suited for production environments where changes need to be more predictable.
| Version Type | Version | Release Date | Security Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stable | 1.28.2 | 2026-02-04 | Fixes CVE-2026-1642 |
| Mainline | 1.29.6 | 2026-03-10 | Fixes CVE-2026-1642, adds sticky sessions |
The latest releases address a security vulnerability related to SSL upstream injection. This vulnerability could allow an attacker to inject arbitrary bytes in client requests passed to SSL upstream servers.
Recommendation: Upgrade to version 1.28.2 (stable) or 1.29.6 (mainline) immediately.
The free and open-source version, maintained as part of the larger NGINX community, with regular updates and releases.
A commercial offering from NGINX, Inc. with additional enterprise-grade features:
NGINX is known for its modular design, allowing users to extend functionality through modules:
As of 2025, NGINX holds approximately 33.8% market share across all websites (W3Techs), making it the #1 web server globally.
| Metric | Market Share | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| W3Techs (April 2025) | 33.8% | #1 (all websites) |
| Netcraft (March 2020) | 20.11% | #2 (million busiest sites) |
| Docker usage (2018 survey) | Most deployed | #1 in containers |
Competitors:
NGINX is used by many high-profile websites and services including:
A fork created by former NGINX developers after Igor Sysoev left F5. Angie aims to continue the open-source development model with additional features.
A fork created by core developer Maxim Dounin in response to F5’s interference with NGINX development. freenginx focuses on maintaining the original NGINX philosophy.
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