Configure Nginx as a Proxy for Apache

and make the required config changes to my virtual host:

The root was set to the correct web directory index.php was added on the index line try_files attempts to serve whatever page the visitor requests. If nginx is unable, then the file is passed to the proxy proxy_pass lets nginx the address of the proxied server Finally the “location ~ /.ht {” location block denies access to .htaccess files, if Apache’s document root concurs with nginx’s one

The instructions in that tutorial proxy requests needing php on to Apachae. In this set up, Nginx is just used to serve static files.

The proxy part of you Nginx server block would look like:

       location ~ \.php$ {
            proxy_set_header X-Real-IP  $remote_addr;
            proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $remote_addr;
            proxy_set_header Host $host;
            proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080;
         }

Personally, I’d just set up Nginx to serve the PHP files as well using fpm unless I had a real need for Apache.