Ubuntu 26.04 ships PHP 8.5 in its default APT repository, and PHP-FPM handles PHP execution through a FastCGI process pool that scales independently of the web server. This guide installs PHP 8.5 with common extensions, configures PHP-FPM, and integrates it with Nginx so PHP requests are processed efficiently. By the end, you'll have PHP and PHP-FPM running with Nginx serving a verified PHP page.

Install PHP

PHP 8.5 is available in Ubuntu 26.04's default APT repository.

1. Update the APT package index:

$ sudo apt update

2. Install PHP:

$ sudo apt install php -y

3. Verify the installed version:

$ php --version

Install PHP Extensions

Extensions add capabilities like database connectivity, image processing, and archive handling.

1. Install common PHP extensions:

$ sudo apt install php-mysql php-mbstring php-bcmath php-zip php-gd php-curl php-xml -y

What you just installed:

• php-mysql: MySQL and MariaDB database connectivity
• php-mbstring: multi-byte character encoding support
• php-bcmath: arbitrary precision mathematics
• php-zip: ZIP archive handling
• php-gd: image creation and manipulation
• php-curl: HTTP client functionality
• php-xml: XML parsing and formatting

2. Verify extensions are loaded:

$ php -m

Install PHP-FPM

PHP-FPM manages a pool of FastCGI worker processes that handle incoming PHP requests from the web server.

1. Install PHP-FPM:

$ sudo apt install php-fpm -y

2. Enable and start the service:

$ sudo systemctl enable php8.5-fpm
$ sudo systemctl start php8.5-fpm

3. Check the service status:

$ sudo systemctl status php8.5-fpm

4. Verify the socket exists:

$ ls /run/php/php8.5-fpm.sock

Integrate with Nginx

1. Install Nginx:

$ sudo apt install nginx -y

2. Create the web root directory:

$ sudo mkdir -p /var/www/app.example.com
$ sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/app.example.com

3. Create the virtual host configuration:

$ sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/app.example.com.conf

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name app.example.com;
    root /var/www/app.example.com;
    index index.php index.html;

    location / {
        try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
    }

    location ~ \.php$ {
        include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
        fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php8.5-fpm.sock;
    }
}

4. Enable the site and reload Nginx:

$ sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/app.example.com.conf /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
$ sudo nginx -t
$ sudo systemctl reload nginx

Verify the Installation

1. Create a PHP info page:

$ sudo nano /var/www/app.example.com/info.php

<?php phpinfo(); ?>

2. Open the page in a browser:

Visit http://app.example.com/info.php. The PHP info page confirms PHP 8.5 is running through PHP-FPM.

3. Remove the info page:

$ sudo rm /var/www/app.example.com/info.php

Next Steps

PHP and PHP-FPM are now installed and integrated with Nginx. From here you can:

• Configure PHP-FPM pool settings in /etc/php/8.5/fpm/pool.d/www.conf to tune concurrency
• Install Laravel or WordPress on the stack
• Add Composer for PHP package management

For the full guide with additional tips, visit the original article on Vultr Docs.