PHP FastCGI on Windows¶

Overview¶

NGINX interfaces with PHP via php-cgi.exe on Windows. While Windows is not the recommended platform for production NGINX deployments, this guide covers the setup for development purposes.

Prerequisites¶

NGINX for Windows
PHP for Windows
Ensure php-cgi.exe is in your PHP installation directory

Quick Start¶

Start PHP FastCGI¶

Create start-php-fcgi.bat:

@ECHO OFF
ECHO Starting PHP FastCGI...
set PATH=C:\PHP;%PATH%
C:\PHP\php-cgi.exe -b 127.0.0.1:9000

Running in Background

To run PHP-CGI hidden, use Windows Task Scheduler or a service wrapper like NSSM (Non-Sucking Service Manager).

NGINX Configuration¶

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name localhost;
    root C:/www;
    index index.php index.html;

    location / {
        try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
    }

    location ~ \.php$ {
        fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
        fastcgi_index index.php;
        fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
        fastcgi_param HTTP_PROXY "";
        include fastcgi_params;
    }
}

Running as Windows Service¶

Using NSSM¶

Download NSSM from nssm.cc
Install PHP-CGI as a service:

nssm install php-cgi "C:\PHP\php-cgi.exe" -b 127.0.0.1:9000
nssm start php-cgi

Install NGINX as a service:

nssm install nginx "C:\nginx\nginx.exe"
nssm set nginx AppDirectory "C:\nginx"
nssm start nginx

Using Task Scheduler¶

Open Task Scheduler
Create a task to run at startup under SYSTEM account
Action: Start program C:\PHP\php-cgi.exe
Arguments: -b 127.0.0.1:9000

Troubleshooting¶

Issue	Solution
502 Bad Gateway	PHP-CGI not running or wrong port
"No input file specified"	Check `SCRIPT_FILENAME` path uses forward slashes
PHP crashes	Increase `PHP_FCGI_MAX_REQUESTS` environment variable

Recommendation¶

Production Use

For production PHP workloads, Linux with PHP-FPM is strongly recommended over Windows. Consider using WSL2 for development if you need Windows.