Serving files: nginx or ftp?

Question

Nginx

There is a server with several TB of movies, series, music. Now the server is loaded due to the huge number of downloaders.

Question: will the server load decrease if nginx is used instead of ftp?

Answer 1

Nginx uses the SendFile command built into the Linux kernel - there is nothing faster.
Putting static on a separate server is good, on several servers it's great.

Answer 2

With nginx, the load should be less. First, HTTP, unlike FTP, does not use different connections for transferring commands and data; uses only one connection per client. Secondly, the architecture of the server plays a role. For example, vsftpd spawns an additional process for each connection. nginx does not do this, processing all connections in cycles in a given number of processes. The resource savings are obvious.

Answer 3

nginx because there are fewer steps between client and server to get content

Answer 4

Yes, the load will be reduced. You can generally keep some files in RAM while minimizing disk access. I also advise you to play around with the network parameters of the kernel using sysctl (there are many guides on this topic on the net).

Answer 5

supported nginx. For example, FTP uses 2 ports, and HTTP uses 1. This fact already says a lot. In general, ftp should die, IMHO.

Answer 6

from experience - nginx,
earlier in the donginx era it distributed static via FTP, now only nginx.