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+date = 2022-12-01
+title = "Enable GZIP Compression in Nginx"
+description = "Learn how to enable compression in Nginx."
++++
+
+## Text Compression
+
+Text compression allows a web server to serve text-based resources
+faster than uncompressed data. This can speed up things like First
+Contentful Paint, Tie to Interactive, and Speed Index.
+
+## Enable Nginx Compression with gzip
+
+In order to enable text compression on Nginx, we need to enable it
+within the configuration file:
+
+```sh
+nano /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
+```
+
+Within the `http` block, find the section that shows
+something like the block below. This is the default gzip configuration I
+found in my `nginx.conf` file on Alpine Linux 3.17. Yours may
+look slightly different, just make sure that you're not creating any
+duplicate gzip options.
+
+```conf
+# Enable gzipping of responses.
+#gzip on;
+
+# Set the Vary HTTP header as defined in the RFC 2616. Default is 'off'.
+gzip_vary on;
+```
+
+Remove the default gzip lines and replace them with the following:
+
+```conf
+# Enable gzipping of responses.
+gzip on;
+gzip_vary on;
+gzip_min_length 10240;
+gzip_proxied expired no-cache no-store private auth;
+gzip_types text/plain text/css text/xml text/javascript application/x-javascript application/xml;
+gzip_disable "MSIE [1-6]";
+```
+
+## Explanations of ngx~httpgzipmodule~ Options
+
+Each of the lines above enables a different aspect of the gzip response
+for Nginx. Here are the full explanations:
+
+-   `gzip` -- Enables or disables gzipping of responses.
+-   `gzip_vary` -- Enables or disables inserting the "Vary:
+    Accept-Encoding" response header field if the directives gzip,
+    gzip~static~, or gunzip are active.
+-   `gzip_min_length` -- Sets the minimum length of a
+    response that will be gzipped. The length is determined only from
+    the "Content-Length" response header field.
+-   `gzip_proxied` -- Enables or disables gzipping of
+    responses for proxied requests depending on the request and
+    response. The fact that the request is proxied is determined by the
+    presence of the "Via" request header field.
+-   `gzip_types` -- Enables gzipping of responses for the
+    specified MIME types in addition to "text/html". The special value
+    "*" matches any MIME type (0.8.29). Responses with the
+    "text/html" type are always compressed.
+-   `gzip_disable` -- Disables gzipping of responses for
+    requests with "User-Agent" header fields matching any of the
+    specified regular expressions.
+    -   The special mask "msie6" (0.7.12) corresponds to the regular
+        expression "MSIE [4-6].", but works faster. Starting from
+        version 0.8.11, "MSIE 6.0; ... SV1" is excluded from this
+        mask.
+
+More information on these directives and their options can be found on
+the [Module
+ngx~httpgzipmodule~](https://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_gzip_module.html)
+page in Nginx's documentation.