How To Start, Stop And Restart Apache Server on Ubuntu Linux

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INTRODUCTION

Apache is part of the popular LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) stack of software. It is included by default in Ubuntu 18.04.

This guide will show you how to start, stop and restart Apache server in Ubuntu Linux using the terminal or command line.

PREREQUISITES

• A user account with sudo or root privileges

• An installed and configured Apache installation

• The apt package manager which is included by default

• Terminal window or command line

Commands for Ubuntu 18.04, 16.04 and Debian 9.x commands

Start Apache Web Server

Use the following command to start the Apache server   

 sudo systemctl start apache2  

Check status to see whether Apache is enabled using the 
following command
 sudo systemctl status apache2  


If it is running,it should display the message active (running) 
as in the image below

Stop Apache Web Server

Use the following commands to stop the Apache Server

 sudo systemctl stop apache2  

Check status to see whether Apache has been disable by typing the following command

 sudo systemctl status apache2  

If it has stopped running, it should display the message inactive(dead) as in the image below

Restart Apache Web Server

Use the following command to restart Apache web server

 sudo systemctl restart apache2  

If Apache was previously disabled, a status check will show it's up and running again. Use the following command to check if it is running again

 sudo systemctl status apache2  

UBUNTU 14.10 OR OLDER DEBIAN

Start Apache Web Server

For Debian and Ubuntu users with an older version, use the following commands in the terminal to start Apache server

 sudo service apache2 start  

or

 sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 start  

It should display the message active(running)

Stop Apache Web Server

To stop Apache use the following command

 sudo service apache2 stop  

or

 sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 stop  

Check status to see if Apache is disabled using the following command

 sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 status  

It should display the message inactive (dead) as shown below

Restart Apache Web Server

  To restart Apache use the following command

 sudo service apache2 restart  

or

 sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart  

The restart command can take several minutes to complete which is absolutely normal and depends on the complexity of your server configuration.

While doing this process please be careful to note that it can cause disruptions to users relying on the server if you are running complex or large server configurations.

Please leave a comment below if you encounter any problems using this guide or if you were successful