How to Manually Compile OpenResty with Nginx, Lua, and Performance Modules on Ubuntu 16.04

Introduction

This tutorial explains how to manually compile OpenResty, a high‑performance web platform built on Nginx and Lua, on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 64‑bit, while avoiding later maintenance costs by using only distribution‑provided dependencies.

Optional Extensions

OpenSSL 1.0.2 with ALPN support for HTTP/2

Nginx‑CT for transparent certificate handling

ngx_PageSpeed for Google‑style performance optimization

Brotli compression (higher ratio than Gzip)

Jemalloc for improved memory management

Environment

The example uses Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 64‑bit.

System Update and Basic Packages

apt update
apt upgrade -y

Prerequisites

Ensure perl (≥5.6.1), libpcre, libssl, and that ldconfig is in the PATH.

Version Variables

Define version variables so future updates only require changing these values.

# Version variables
OpenSSLVersion='openssl-1.0.2n'   # Ubuntu 16.04 default is 1.0.2
NginxCTVersion='1.3.2'
PageSpeedVersion='1.12.34.3'
SystemBit='X64'
OpenRestyVersion='openresty-1.13.6.1'

Install Build Dependencies

sudo apt-get install libpcre3-dev libssl-dev perl make build-essential curl
apt install build-essential libreadline-dev libncurses5-dev libpcre3 libpcre3-dev libssl-dev zlib1g-dev unzip git perl make libjemalloc1 libjemalloc-dev libxml2 libxml2-dev libxslt-dev

Download Source Code

All sources are placed under /root/src for easy management.

cd /root
mkdir src
cd src

Download OpenResty and its extensions:

# OpenSSL (Ubuntu 16.04 already provides 1.0.2)
#wget https://www.openssl.org/source/$OpenSSLVersion.tar.gz
#tar xzf $OpenSSLVersion.tar.gz

wget https://github.com/grahamedgecombe/nginx-ct/archive/v$NginxCTVersion.tar.gz
tar xzf v$NginxCTVersion.tar.gz

git clone https://github.com/google/ngx_brotli.git
cd ngx_brotli
git submodule update --init
cd ..

wget https://github.com/apache/incubator-pagespeed-ngx/archive/v$PageSpeedVersion-stable.zip
unzip v$PageSpeedVersion-stable.zip
cd incubator-pagespeed-ngx-$PageSpeedVersion-stable/
wget https://dl.google.com/dl/page-speed/psol/1.12.34.2-$SystemBit.tar.gz
tar -xzvf 1.12.34.2-$SystemBit.tar.gz
cd ..

wget -c https://openresty.org/download/$OpenRestyVersion.tar.gz
tar zxf $OpenRestyVersion.tar.gz

Configure Build

Enter the OpenResty source directory and run ./configure with performance‑oriented options.

cd $OpenRestyVersion

./configure \
  --prefix=/usr/local/openresty \
  --user=www \
  --group=www \
  --with-pcre-jit \
  --with-stream \
  --with-stream_ssl_module \
  --with-stream=dynamic \
  --with-file-aio \
  --with-threads \
  --with-cc-opt="-O3" \
  --with-http_v2_module \
  --with-http_realip_module \
  --with-http_mp4_module \
  --with-http_gzip_static_module \
  --with-http_ssl_module \
  --with-http_stub_status_module \
  --with-http_xslt_module \
  --with-http_iconv_module \
  --without-http_redis2_module \
  --with-openssl-opt=enable-tlsext \
  -j8

Resolving a Common Error

Solution: sudo apt-get install libxml2 libxml2-dev libxslt-dev

Compile

Build the source. Use parallel jobs if the machine has multiple CPU cores.

make
make -j2   # Example for a 2‑core CPU

Assuming you have 2 CPU cores.

Install

After a successful build, install OpenResty system‑wide.

sudo make install

Root privileges (sudo) are typically required on Linux.

Configure Environment Variables

OpenResty is installed to /usr/local/openresty/. Add its binaries to PATH:

export PATH=/usr/local/openresty/bin:/usr/local/openresty/nginx/sbin:$PATH

For Bash, add the line to ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile for persistence.

Create systemd Service

Create /etc/systemd/system/openresty.service using the following content (downloaded from a gist):

cd /etc/systemd/system/
wget https://gist.githubusercontent.com/ivmm/dbf03e6c7970488652878bb8ddc3a775/raw/48436d911d08e57774c759bdb50548dec31dc86f/openresty.service

Reload systemd, restart the service, and enable it at boot:

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl restart openresty
systemctl enable openresty

After this, accessing the server’s IP shows the OpenResty welcome page.

Replace Default nginx.conf

Download a ready‑made nginx.conf and place it under /usr/local/openresty/nginx/conf/:

cd /usr/local/openresty/nginx/conf/
rm nginx.conf -rf
wget https://gist.githubusercontent.com/ivmm/ab81dee184b64036bd4b8d5abe676264/raw/1cbfbc387aa956f6d9afe39d60e2b8c988a10688/nginx.conf

Finally, test the configuration and reload:

nginx -t
nginx -s reload