My basic nginx config files for proxying to a node.js application

default

server {
  listen   YOUR_IP_ADDRESS:80 default_server; 

  root /var/www/nginx;
  index index.html index.htm;

  # This is just an invalid value which will never trigger on a real hostname.
  server_name _;

  server_name_in_redirect off;

  location / {
    # First attempt to serve request as file, then
    # as directory, then fall back to index.html
    try_files $uri $uri/ /index.html;
  }

}

domain.tld

# The upstream module is the link between Node.js and Nginx.
# Upstream is used for proxying requests to other servers.
# All requests for / get distributed between any of the servers listed.
upstream app_domain.tld {
  
  server 127.0.0.1:3001 max_fails=0 fail_timeout=10s weight=1;

  # Send visitors back to the same server each time.
  ip_hash;
 
  # Enable number of keep-alive connections.
  keepalive 512;
}
 
server {
  listen YOUR_IP_ADDRESS:80;
 
  # Index files.
  index index.html;
 
  server_name domain.tld;
 
  # Timeout for closing keep-alive connections.
  keepalive_timeout 10;
  
  # Enable gzip compression.
  gzip on;
  gzip_http_version 1.1;
  gzip_vary on;
  gzip_comp_level 6;
  gzip_proxied any;
  gzip_buffers 16 8k;
  gzip_disable "MSIE [1-6]\.(?!.*SV1)";
  
  # Max upload size.
  # client_max_body_size 16M;
 
  # Change access and error log files.
  access_log /home/richard/www/logs/domain.tld-nginx.log;

  location / {
    # Set this to your upstream module.
    proxy_pass http://app_domain.tld;
    # Proxy headers.
    proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    proxy_set_header Host $host;
    proxy_set_header X-NginX-Proxy true;
    proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
    proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
    proxy_cache_bypass $http_upgrade;
    proxy_http_version 1.1;
    proxy_redirect off;
    # Go to next upstream after if server down.
    proxy_next_upstream error timeout http_500 http_502 http_503 http_504;
    proxy_connect_timeout 5s;
    # Gateway timeout.
    proxy_read_timeout 20s;
    proxy_send_timeout 20s;
    # Buffer settings.
    proxy_buffers 8 32k;
    proxy_buffer_size 64k;
  }
  
  # Serve static files without going through upstreams
  location ~ ^/(images/|img/|javascript/|js/|css/|stylesheets/|flash/|media/|static/|robots.txt|humans.txt|favicon.ico) {
    root /home/richard/www/sites/domain.tld/public;
    access_log off;
    expires 1h;
  }
 
}