Nginx fails to stop and nginx.pid is missing

Question

I want to stop Nginx but it fails like this.

$ sudo service nginx stop
Stopping nginx:                                            [FAILED]

And nginx.conf that defines place of nginx.pid have a line.

# /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
pid        /var/run/nginx.pid;

But there is no nginx.pid in the directory /var/run/.

locate nginx.pid shows this output.

/var/run/nginx.pid 
/var/run/nginx.pid.oldbin

But after updatedb there is no match for the search. I'm using nginx/1.4.4 in CentOS release 6.5 (Final).

What should I do to stop the nginx daemon?

Edit 2014/01/07

This is output of ps -ef | grep nginx, it seems nginx daemon is still running.

ironsand 17065 16933  0 15:55 pts/0    00:00:00 grep --color nginx
root     19506     1  0  2013 ?        00:00:00 nginx: master process /usr/sbin/nginx -c /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
ironsand 19507 19506  0  2013 ?        00:00:25 nginx: worker process

And sudo service nginx restart gives this error. I think nginx fails to start because old one still alive. And /var/log/nginx/error.log-2014017 contains also this error.

Stopping nginx:                                            [FAILED]
Starting nginx: nginx: [emerg] bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use)
nginx: [emerg] bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use)
nginx: [emerg] bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use)
nginx: [emerg] bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use)
nginx: [emerg] bind() to 0.0.0.0:80 failed (98: Address already in use)
nginx: [emerg] still could not bind()
                                                           [FAILED]

The system can't stop nginx if it isn't running and since there's no PID file, I suspect it is already stopped. You can check with `ps -ef | grep nginx` or `sudo netstat -tlnp | grep nginx`. — Ladadadada, Jan 06 '14 at 16:18

score 48 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 11 '20 at 10:02

48

I will recommend stopping nginx by killing it's master process first. The nginx is not shutdown properly may be because of that it can't be stopped using init script.

ps -ef |grep nginx

This will show you the PID of nginx master process. Like you mentioned above:

root 19506 1 0 2013 ? 00:00:00 nginx: master process /usr/sbin/nginx -c /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

Kill it using

kill -9 19506

Verify once again whether there is any nginx process running or port 80 is occupied. If you see any process is bind to port 80, Identify the PID and check if it can be killed.

ps -ef |grep nginx

netstat -tulpn |grep 80

make sure the filesystem is fine and you can read/write to /var file system. Then Start nginx

service nginx start

edited Jun 11 '20 at 10:02

Community

1

answered Jan 07 '14 at 07:46

sandeep.s85

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Thanks! After killing master process, I had to kill also nginx worker process. Then I can finally start nginx daemon. – ironsand Jan 07 '14 at 07:56
Thanks @sandeep.s85. Useful to me too. Out of interest what would cause the nginx.pid file to be missing while nginx is running? – Codemonkey Feb 02 '17 at 16:22
This has just happened again for me, I wish I knew what causes it. – Codemonkey Feb 22 '17 at 09:51
My nginx master process come back to live after I kill it. – WTIFS Jun 28 '18 at 03:39

score 14 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 15 '16 at 08:57

14

Problem

For me the pid file name was different in those two files:

/usr/lib/systemd/system/nginx.service
- pid /var/run/nginx.pid;
/etc/nginx/nginx.conf
- PIDFile=/run/nginx.pid

Those two need to match.

Fix:

So I adjusted it in /usr/lib/systemd/system/nginx.service and then did:

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl start nginx

Then it came up correctly.

answered Jul 15 '16 at 08:57

Patrick Boos

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How come? In Ubuntu `/var/run/` is a symlink of `/run/` – Z. Zlatev Oct 29 '16 at 07:28
Yea so that is not a solution at all. But in my case everything is /run/nginx.pid. – Melroy van den Berg Jan 26 '17 at 20:33
My nginx.conf had pid logs/nginx.pid in it - changed to /run/nginx.pid and it was fixed, thanks Patrick! – phpguru Jan 26 '17 at 20:33
You've mixed up the files in your problem description: `PIDFile` is from the systemd unit `/usr/lib/systemd/system/nginx.service`. – Sebastian Schrader Jan 02 '20 at 16:13
It may have to do something with this nginx bug where the original pidfile is deleted. https://trac.nginx.org/nginx/ticket/796 – gkhnavarro Jul 29 '20 at 03:08

score 10 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 14 '15 at 19:58

I had this problem, and running ps -ef | grep nginx would show me workers that would keep spinning up, despite killing the master process as suggested by the accepted answer:

[~]# ps -ef | grep nginx
nginx    10730     1  0 Sep14 ?        00:00:16 nginx: cache manager process            
nginx    18469     1  0 Oct09 ?        00:11:02 nginx: worker process                   
nginx    25779     1  0 Oct13 ?        00:01:31 nginx: worker process                   
nginx    26458     1  0 15:45 ?        00:00:00 nginx: worker process

So my solution to fix it was simply this: pkill nginx && service nginx restart

score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Apr 18 '16 at 07:10

1

My problem was that I had pid specified in two different conf files. After I removed one reference then deleted the .pid file and started nginx again it started behaving normally.

edited Apr 18 '16 at 07:10

chicks

3,639
10
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answered Apr 17 '16 at 22:51

matthewdaniel

111
1

Yep this one, the PID is defined in /usr/lib/systemd/system/nginx-debug.service and /etc/nginx/nginx.conf – edmondscommerce May 09 '16 at 14:37

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Mar 04 '20 at 12:36

0

Try this:

sudo fuser -k 443/tcp
sudo fuser -k 80/tcp

Found it here: https://www.digitalocean.com/community/questions/nginx-is-unable-to-bind-to-443

answered Mar 04 '20 at 12:36

Komal

1

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Jan 06 '14 at 16:21

This seems to indicate that nginx is crashing immediately, if it had been started earlier. Have you checked the contents of /var/log/nginx* to see what the process is doing?

EDIT: Also, if you tell us your OS and version of nginx, we can give more detailed answers.

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Jan 07 '14 at 07:45

I'd need more information to be sure but, I'm guessing you already have another web server running rather than the instance of ngnix you want itself so you need to find it - the error says port 80 is in use, but not by what

Try netstat -tulpn - You're looking for an entry under local address that ends with :80 - this will also give you the program name and PID so you can identify it. Here's mine - I'm running lighttpd and its shown on the 3rd line.

Active Internet connections (only servers)
Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State       PID/Program name
tcp        0      0 127.0.0.1:5000          0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      4684/rtorrent
tcp        0      0 127.0.0.1:9000          0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      923/php-fpm.conf)
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:80              0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      972/lighttpd
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:6901            0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      4684/rtorrent
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:22              0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      720/sshd
tcp6       0      0 :::22                   :::*                    LISTEN      720/sshd
udp        0      0 0.0.0.0:6881            0.0.0.0:*                           4684/rtorrent

Shut down the other web server properly (since if its spawning off upstart, a normal 'kill' may not work) and try starting ngnix. If thats the case, you can/should then edit your init scripts to stop the other web server from starting, or adjust its configuration on another power.

Thanks for your help. `netstat -tulpn` shows `tcp 0 0 0.0.0.0:80 0.0.0.0:* LISTEN 19507/nginx`. So somehow nginx occupied that port. But as sandeep said, I killed nginx process then it works. I appreciate your help! — ironsand, Jan 07 '14 at 08:00

score 0 · Answer 8 · edited Apr 26 '18 at 16:47

I had a similar issue with Ubuntu 10.10 and a compiled version of nginx running in /opt/nginx/sbin.

check both /opt/nginx/conf/nginx.conf and /etc/nginx/nginx.conf files and verify they match.

Adjust /etc/init.d/nginx startup file to match nginx.pid location test using:

sudo /etc/init.d/nginx configtest # should show no failures
sudo /etc/init.d/nginx start      # should show starting
sudo /etc/init.d/nginx status     # should show running
sudo /etc/init.d/nginx stop       # should show stopping -- (wait for a few)
sudo /etc/init.d/nginx status     # should show can not access PID file for nginx
sudo netstat -tap  # should not show nginx program running with open local address

score 0 · Answer 9 · answered Aug 14 '18 at 16:25

0

To stop nginx check the manual how to do it man nginx.

The default way should be to use the stop signal with nginx -s stop.

Should be that simple really. Your options are :

stop, quit, reopen, reload.

answered Aug 14 '18 at 16:25

prosti

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Nginx fails to stop and nginx.pid is missing

Edit 2014/01/07

9 Answers9

Problem

Fix: