Caddy is a general-purpose web server for Windows, Mac, Linux, BSD, and Android. It is a capable but easier alternative to other popular web servers.

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• Features
• Quick Start
• Running from Source
• Running in Production
• Contributing
• About the Project

Features

• Easy configuration with Caddyfile
• Automatic HTTPS via Let's Encrypt; Caddy obtains and manages all cryptographic assets for you
• HTTP/2 enabled by default (powered by Go standard library)
• Virtual hosting for hundreds of sites per server instance, including TLS SNI
• Experimental QUIC support for those that like speed
• TLS session ticket key rotation for more secure connections
• Brilliant extensibility so Caddy can be customized for your needs
• Runs anywhere with no external dependencies (not even libc)

Quick Start

Caddy binaries have no dependencies and are available for every platform. Install Caddy any one of these ways:

• Download page allows you to customize your build in the browser
• Latest release for pre-built binaries
• curl getcaddy.com for auto install: curl https://getcaddy.com | bash

Once caddy is in your PATH, you can cd to your website's folder and run caddy to serve it. By default, Caddy serves the current directory at localhost:2015.

To customize how your site is served, create a file named Caddyfile by your site and paste this into it:

localhost

gzip
browse
websocket /echo cat
ext    .html
log    /var/log/access.log
proxy  /api 127.0.0.1:7005
header /api Access-Control-Allow-Origin *

When you run caddy in that directory, it will automatically find and use that Caddyfile to configure itself.

This simple file enables compression, allows directory browsing (for folders without an index file), hosts a WebSocket echo server at /echo, serves clean URLs, logs requests to access.log, proxies all API requests to a backend on port 7005, and adds the coveted Access-Control-Allow-Origin: * header for all responses from the API.

Wow! Caddy can do a lot with just a few lines.

To host multiple sites and do more with the Caddyfile, please see the Caddyfile documentation.

Note that production sites are served over HTTPS by default.

Caddy has a command line interface. Run caddy -h to view basic help or see the CLI documentation for details.

Running as root: We advise against this. You can still listen on ports < 1024 using setcap like so: sudo setcap cap_net_bind_service=+ep ./caddy

Running from Source

Note: You will need Go 1.6 or newer.

1. go get github.com/mholt/caddy/caddy
2. cd into your website's directory
3. Run caddy (assuming $GOPATH/bin is in your $PATH)

Caddy's main() is in the caddy subfolder. To recompile Caddy, use build.bash found in that folder.

Running in Production

The Caddy project does not officially maintain any system-specific integrations, but your download file includes unofficial resources contributed by the community that you may find helpful for running Caddy in production.

How you choose to run Caddy is up to you. Many users are satisfied with nohup caddy &. Others use screen. Users who need Caddy to come back up after reboots either do so in the script that caused the reboot, add a command to an init script, or configure a service with their OS.

Contributing

Join our community where you can chat with other Caddy users and developers!

Please see our contributing guidelines and check out the developer wiki.

We use GitHub issues and pull requests only for discussing bug reports and the development of specific changes. We welcome all other topics on the forum!

If you want to contribute to the documentation, please submit pull requests to caddyserver/caddyserver.com.

Thanks for making Caddy -- and the Web -- better!

Special thanks to for hosting the Caddy project.

About the Project

Caddy was born out of the need for a "batteries-included" web server that runs anywhere and doesn't have to take its configuration with it. Caddy took inspiration from spark, nginx, lighttpd, Websocketd and Vagrant, which provides a pleasant mixture of features from each of them.

The name "Caddy": The name of the software is "Caddy", not "Caddy Server" or "CaddyServer". Please call it "Caddy" or, if you wish to clarify, "the Caddy web server". See brand guidelines.

Author on Twitter: @mholt6