--- title: "Monitoring Nginx Requests with Prometheus" description: "A walkthrough on deploying Prometheus and Grafana with Docker Compose, monitoring Nginx request metrics via nginx-prometheus-exporter, and validating performance with K6 load testing." canonical_url: "https://blog.markkulab.net/en/post/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests" author: "Mark Ku" author_url: "https://blog.markkulab.net/en/author/mark-ku" site: "Mark Ku's Tech Notes" date_published: "2024-11-25T01:01:35+08:00" category: "Cloud" tags: ["prometheus", "grafana", "nginx", "docker", "monitoring", "k6"] language: "en" license: "CC BY 4.0" license_url: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" attribution: "when reusing or quoting, credit the author and link back to the original" --- # Monitoring Nginx Requests with Prometheus ## Introduction Prometheus and Grafana are a common combination in the Kubernetes ecosystem. This post demonstrates how to use Prometheus to monitor Nginx requests and visualize the data with Grafana. ## Understanding Nginx `stub_status` Before spinning up the Prometheus container, let's take a look at Nginx's `stub_status` module. It exposes basic runtime metrics about Nginx, and Prometheus primarily relies on `stub_status` to collect data from Nginx. ### Configuring the Dockerfile First, create a Dockerfile that builds on the Nginx image with custom configuration: ```dockerfile FROM nginx COPY nginx.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf ``` ### Creating `nginx.conf` Next, write an `nginx.conf` to enable the Nginx status page, which Prometheus will scrape: ```nginx server { listen 80; # 使用本地端口 server_name localhost; # 設定為 localhost location /nginx_status { stub_status on; # 啟用狀態模組 access_log off; allow all; # 允許所有 IP 訪問 } } ``` ### Build and Start the Container Build the Docker image and start the container: ```bash docker build -t my-nginx:latest . docker run -d -p 8881:80 --name nginx-prometheus-exporter my-nginx:latest ``` ## Accessing the Nginx Status Page Once the container is running, visit `http://localhost:8881/nginx_status` and you'll see a page similar to this: ![Nginx Status](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/nginx-status.png) ### Nginx Status Fields Explained **Active connections: 2** There are currently 2 active connections. **server accepts handled requests: 2 2 2** - **2**: Number of accepted connections. - **2**: Number of successfully handled connections. - **2**: Total number of requests (can exceed connection count, since one connection can serve multiple requests). **Reading: 0 Writing: 1 Waiting: 1** - **Reading: 0**: Connections currently reading a request. - **Writing: 1**: Connections currently sending a response. - **Waiting: 1**: Idle connections waiting for the next request (HTTP Keep-Alive). Note: The server load is currently light — 2 connections total, 1 actively handling a request and 1 waiting for the next one. ## Container Stack Overview grafana (dashboard visualization) > prometheus-exporter (actively scrapes data) > nginx-prometheus-exporter (exposes Nginx metrics to Prometheus) > nginx status (web server providing status information) ## Setting Up All Service Containers Remove any previously created test containers, then create a `deployment.yaml` to deploy all services together. ### `deployment.yaml` Example ```yaml version: "3.8" services: mynginx: build: ./nginx/ container_name: mynginx ports: - 8885:80 nginx-prometheus-exporter: image: nginx/nginx-prometheus-exporter container_name: nginx-prometheus-exporter command: -nginx.scrape-uri http://nginx:80/nginx_status ports: - 9113:9113 depends_on: - nginx prometheus: image: prom/prometheus:v2.35.0 container_name: prometheus volumes: - ./prometheus.yaml:/etc/prometheus/prometheus.yaml - ./prometheus_data:/prometheus command: - "--config.file=/etc/prometheus/prometheus.yaml" ports: - "9090:9090" renderer: image: grafana/grafana-image-renderer environment: BROWSER_TZ: Asia/Taipei ports: - "8082:8081" grafana: image: grafana/grafana container_name: grafana volumes: - ./grafana_data:/var/lib/grafana environment: GF_SECURITY_ADMIN_PASSWORD: pass GF_RENDERING_SERVER_URL: http://renderer:8082/render GF_RENDERING_CALLBACK_URL: http://grafana:3007/ GF_LOG_FILTERS: rendering:debug depends_on: - prometheus - renderer ports: - "3007:3000" ``` ### Prometheus Configuration Write a `prometheus.yaml` to configure how Prometheus scrapes data: ```yaml global: scrape_interval: 5s # 設定抓取頻率 external_labels: monitor: "my-monitor" scrape_configs: - job_name: "prometheus" static_configs: - targets: ["localhost:9090"] - job_name: "nginx_exporter" static_configs: - targets: ["nginx-prometheus-exporter:9113"] ``` Start the services with Docker Compose: ```bash docker-compose -f ./deployment.yaml up -d ``` ## Checking Prometheus Targets Open [http://localhost:9090/targets](http://localhost:9090/targets) in your browser to view the status of Prometheus scrape targets. ![Prometheus Targets](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/prometheus-target.png) ## Graphing Nginx Metrics in Prometheus Switch to the Graph tab in Prometheus and search for `nginx` to plot real-time charts based on Nginx metrics: ![Prometheus Graph](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/prometheus-graph.png) That said, Prometheus charts are fairly basic. For richer dashboards and more filtering options, Grafana is the way to go. ## Connecting Grafana to Prometheus 1. Open the Grafana dashboard ([http://localhost:3007/](http://localhost:3007/)). 2. Go to "Connection", click "Add new connection", and select "Prometheus". ![Grafana Prometheus](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/grafana-add-prometheus.png) ## Creating a Grafana Dashboard You can download a ready-made dashboard template from the [Grafana Dashboard marketplace](https://grafana.com/grafana/dashboards/) to display Nginx metrics. ### Download a Dashboard Template [Download Dashboard JSON](https://grafana.com/grafana/dashboards/18144-nginx2/) ![Download Dashboard Settings](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/download-dashboard-json.png) ## Importing the Dashboard Template Back in Grafana, click "New Import" and import the JSON template you downloaded. ![Import Dashboard Settings](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/import-dashboard.png) ## Running a K6 Load Test Write a K6 load test script to simulate traffic and validate Nginx performance: ```javascript import http from 'k6/http'; import { check, sleep } from 'k6'; export const options = { stages: [ { duration: '30s', target: 3000 }, // 負載測試從 0 到 3000 個虛擬使用者，持續 30 秒 { duration: '1m30s', target: 3000 }, // 維持 3000 個虛擬使用者，持續 1 分 30 秒 { duration: '20s', target: 0 }, // 減少虛擬使用者數量 ] }; export default function () { const res = http.get('http://192.168.0.88:8885/nginx_status'); // your nginx ip check(res, { 'status was 200': (r) => r.status == 200 }); sleep(1); } ``` Using the Docker-based K6 image means no local installation required: ``` // Windows 腳本 cat script.js | docker run --rm -i grafana/k6 run - ``` ## Viewing Live Data in Grafana After running the load test, the Grafana dashboard will display live Nginx metrics such as active connection counts. ![Grafana Live Data](https://blog.markkulab.net/content/markku/posts/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests/images/final-dashboard.png) ## Source Code All code and configuration files are available on [GitHub](https://github.com/markku636/Prometheus). ## References * [使用 Prometheus 和 Grafana 打造監控預警系統 (Docker 篇)](https://pin-yi.me/blog/docker/prometheus-grafana-docker/#prometheus) * [prometheus-adapter结合custom metrics API 实现kubetnetes自定义HPA](https://blog.csdn.net/weixin_43391291/article/details/142212854) --- ## About this article and its author Originally published on [Mark Ku's Tech Notes](https://blog.markkulab.net/en/post/prometheus-monitoring-nginx-requests) License: [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — when reusing or quoting, credit the author and link back to the original ### About the author **[Mark Ku](https://blog.markkulab.net/en/author/mark-ku)** — Software Solution Provider - 10+ years senior software engineer, now an AI Builder - Focused on large-platform architecture — North-American e-commerce, AI SaaS subscription billing - Combining AI Agents and automation to build evolvable product foundations ### Free tools built by the author All of these are free to use: - [Free PDF Sign Tool](https://blog.markkulab.net/en/tools/pdf-sign): Online PDF sign tool — draw, type, or upload a signature, then drag, resize, and download. 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