We're pleased to present the next previews of Caddy 2.9! While in beta, new features and changes may be unstable, so please test in suitable environments that may expose issues so we can fix them before the stable release.

While there are some features in this release (such as socket-activation-listeners), we've focused mainly on refinements and bug fixes in many areas, including:

• Config loading
• Events
• Logging
• Placeholders
• Reverse proxy and HTTP server performance
• Matchers
• HTTP (esp. HTTP/3)
• Metrics (per-host metrics)

We hope you will enjoy the 2.9 beta releases. Please try them out and report bugs! There is still more to come before the stable 2.9.0 release!

Thanks to all contributors, bug reporters, and helpers.

What's Changed

• Make it possible to configure the DisableStorageCheck setting for certmagic by @ankon in #6368
• caddyhttp: Add test case to corpus by @mholt in #6374
• cmd: remove zealous check of Caddyfile auto-detection by @mohammed90 in #6370
• ci: upgrade to goreleaser v2 by @mohammed90 in #6376
• logging: Allow setting log file permissions by @ririsoft in #6314
• Split run into a public BuildContext and a private part by @ankon in #6378
• Write the header if none had been written in WriteResponse by @ankon in #6380
• fix file mode configuration parsing by @ririsoft in #6383
• go.mod: update tscert package by @willnorris in #6384
• logging: Customizable zapcore.Core by @kkroo in #6381
• logging: set file mode when the file already exist. by @ririsoft in #6391
• caddyfile: Pass blocks to import for snippets by @elee1766 in #6130
• reverseproxy: add Max-Age option to sticky cookie by @JasonYuan869 in #6398
• fileserver: Remove newline characters from precomputed etags by @armadi1809 in #6394
• fix: http.intercept.header.* placeholders by @dunglas in #6429
• reverseproxy: Only log host is up status on change by @klaxa in #6419
• fix: don't compress already compressed fonts by @dunglas in #6432
• caddyhttp: Reject 0-RTT early data in IP matchers and set Early-Data header when proxying by @mholt in #6427
• reverseproxy: Add placeholder for host in active health check headers by @francislavoie in #6440
• browse: add Content-Security-Policy w/ nonce by @steffenbusch in #6425
• browse: fix Content-Security-Policy warnings in Firefox by @steffenbusch in #6443
• fileserver: Exclude symlink target size from total, show arrow on size by @francislavoie in #6412
• reverseproxy: Fix dynamic upstreams ip version by @armadi1809 in #6448
• reverseproxy: Add placeholder for networkAddr in active health check headers by @dylanschultzie in #6450
• Add option to set which HTTP method to use for active health checks by @jbro in #6453
• reverseproxy: Caddyfile support for health_method by @jbro in #6454
• reverseproxy: add health_upstream subdirective by @dylanschultzie in #6451
• ci: correct -tags nobadger on binary build by @girlbossceo in #6470
• Caddyfile support for TLS handshake matchers by @vnxme in #6461
• Caddyfile support for TLS connection and certificate selection policies by @vnxme in #6462
• chore: update golangci config by @mohammed90 in #6479
• encode: flush already compressed data to the stream by @WeidiDeng in #6471
• proxyprotocol: Update WrapListener to use ConnPolicyFunc for PROXY protocol by @pi-prakhar in #6485
• fileserver: add sort options by @lollipopkit in #6468
• go.mod: update quic-go package by @WeidiDeng in #6498
• Runtime placeholders for selected TLS and HTTP matchers by @vnxme in #6480
• replacer: {file.*} global placeholder strips trailing newline by @steffenbusch in #6411
• go.mod: update update golang/x/net by @WeidiDeng in #6500
• reverse_proxy: apply keep-alive setting for h2c requests by @WeidiDeng in #6343
• Fix a regression in #6480: the context may have no replacer by @vnxme in #6510
• caddyhttp: Export PrivateRangesCIDR() for plugins after #6480 by @vnxme in #6514
• ignore exec.ErrDot when starting caddy in background by @WeidiDeng in #6512
• ci: don't exit early on error in remote CI machine by @mohammed90 in #6519
• reverseproxy: Active health checks request body option by @jbro in #6520
• reverseproxy: Change logs for write errors to warn level by @jum in #6532
• cmd: Use a factory to create the caddy root command by @elee1766 in #6533
• chore: Fix a typo by @sunnyagain in #6534
• error: run error (msg) through replacer by @mohammed90 in #6536
• reverseproxy: allow user to define source address by @mohammed90 in #6504
• chore: build and test with Go 1.23 by @dunglas in #6526
• tls: use Go default kex for the moment that include PQC by @bwesterb in #6542
• ci: prepare syso files for windows embedding in release by @WeidiDeng in #6406
• Performance: Prevents the zap logger from serializing the request in rewrite.go. by @AlliBalliBaba in #6541
• fileserver: move sort to browse by @lollipopkit in #6502
• reverse_proxy: add placeholder http.reverse_proxy.retries by @steffenbusch in #6553
• fix(#6551): Unexpected behaviour if caddyhttp.Route is provisioned twice by @jbro in #6558
• caddytls: Add sni_regexp matcher by @vnxme in #6569
• rewrite: Avoid panic on bad arg count for uri by @mister-turtle in #6571
• perf: use zap's Check() to prevent useless allocs by @dunglas in #6560
• ci: update the linter action version by @mohammed90 in #6575
• update quic-go to v0.47.0 by @marten-seemann in #6582
• quic: enable qlog, controlled by QLOGDIR env by @marten-seemann in #6581
• caddytls: Give a better error message when given encrypted private keys by @francislavoie in #6591
• chore: Use slices package where possible by @francislavoie in #6585
• caddyhttp: Optimize logs using zap's WithLazy() by @AlliBalliBaba in #6590
• doc: remove docs of deprecated directives by @mohammed90 in #6566
• Implement issue #6296 passing FDs / socket activation by @MayCXC in #6573
• caddyhttp: Fix listener wrapper regression from #6573 by @MayCXC in #6599
• chore: Adjust incorrect reverse_proxy Caddyfile comment by @francislavoie in #6598
• http: ReponseWriter prefer ReadFrom if available by @WeidiDeng in #6565
• caddytls: Support new tls.context module by @mholt in #6369
• Better errors when reloading by @mholt in #6601
• caddyhttp: Escaping placeholders in CEL, add vars and vars_regexp by @francislavoie in #6594
• autohttps: Implement auto_https prefer_wildcard option by @francislavoie in #6146
• metrics: scope metrics to active config, add optional per-host metrics by @mohammed90 in #6531
• ci: install xcaddy to fix release flow by @mohammed90 in #6602
• caddytls: Drop rate_limit and burst, has been deprecated by @francislavoie in #6611
• tests: Fix adapt test warning by @mohammed90 in #6619
• docs: expand...

This beta is outdated, please use the latest version.

Hotfix for the Caddyfile detection regression in v2.8.2. The v2.8.3 tag was mistakenly made on the wrong commit and is skipped.

Changelog

• 7088605 cmd: fix regression in auto-detect of Caddyfile (#6362)

A few more fixes of reported bugs related to ARI, try_files with the root path (/), and Caddyfile adapter detection on the CLI. See 2.8.0 release notes for details on 2.8.

Changelog

• 01308b4 I'm so tired of typos
• a63767d build(deps): bump golangci/golangci-lint-action from 5 to 6 (#6361)
• f8a2c60 caddyhttp: properly sanitize requests for root path (#6360)
• b7280e6 caddytls: Implement certmagic.RenewalInfoGetter
• 15faeac cmd: fix auto-detetction of .caddyfile extension (#6356)

Full Changelog: v2.8.1...v2.8.2

Quick fixes for a few users related to directory permissions and matcher parsing.

Changelog

• 40c582c caddyhttp: Fix merging consecutive client_ip or remote_ip matchers (#6350)
• a52917a core: MkdirAll appDataDir in InstanceID with 0o700 (#6340)

Caddy 2.8 is here! With hundreds of improvements, Caddy is more scalable and capable than ever before. Featuring ACME Renewal Information (ARI) support, HTTP/3 to proxy backends, and so much more than we can list in a sentence, we are pleased to bring you one of the biggest Caddy updates yet. Documentation on our website will be updated in the coming days.

We've implemented a ton of improvements, fixes, and awesome new features based on your feedback. While some of them aren't particularly visible changes, they allow Caddy to scale better and be more reliable in demanding deployments. Many of the changes are quality-of-life improvements we hope you'll appreciate. Then there's improvements to ACMEz, CertMagic, and other dependencies which make Caddy better that may not show up in this list.

There was a lot of code that had been documented as deprecated in place for a long time, so this version introduces a few more breaking changes than usual; please review the notes below.

Thank you to our sponsors and everyone in the community who contributed -- over 40 of you made your first contribution for this release. We couldn't have done it without your help. In particular, we'd like to recognize sponsors Stripe, Framer, and ZeroSSL for their positive influence which have greatly enhanced the project. Caddy 2.8 is already being used in our sponsors' large-scale, multi-region production deployments.

Want to join those ranks? Sponsor the Caddy project and benefit from development priority, dedicated private support, and much more.

As with any server upgrades, please be sure to test and validate your configurations in a staging or test environment before deploying to production. Thank you and have a great day!

⚠️ Breaking changes:

• ZeroSSL (#6229) (this is one overall change, but requires some explanation):
  • Up to now, Caddy used both Let's Encrypt and ZeroSSL by default to get certificates without any configuration. In 2.8, this is changing slightly. Due to upcoming changes to ZeroSSL accounting policies, ZeroSSL now requires your email address to be able to access their free ACME endpoint.
  • As such, Caddy will only implicitly add the ZeroSSL issuer to your config if you provide an email address in your Caddyfile using the email global option. (We have already recommended this for years.) If you already do this, you don't have to make any changes and you'll still get Let's Encrypt and ZeroSSL automatically as defaults.
  • If you use JSON to configure certificate automation policies, you will need to ensure you use the acme issuer with your email filled out, and the ca field set to ZeroSSL's ACME server URL. If you want redundancy with Let's Encrypt, be sure to specify another acme issuer as well (defaults OK, but we recommend setting an email there too).
  • The zerossl issuer module is no longer ACME-capable and is now exclusively for the ZeroSSL API. An API key from your ZeroSSL account is required. (The ZeroSSL ACME server can still be used with the acme module pointed to ZeroSSL's ACME server. You can provide your account email and/or EAB as well.) If you were using the ZeroSSL issuer with an API key, it will now start using ZeroSSL's API, which was probably the expected behavior anyways. The API has several advantages over the ACME endpoint, but may require payment:
    • Faster response times
    • IP certificates
    • Management tools in your ZeroSSL account dashboard
    • Technical support
  • To clarify, Let's Encrypt is still a default issuer even if you don't provide an email address (but we have always strongly recommended to do so).
  • You can still use ZeroSSL's ACME endpoint with your own External Account Binding (EAB) credentials.
  • See notes in #6229 for some examples and further explanations.
• Removed support for the lego_deprecated DNS provider module. It has been deprecated for 4 years. Use caddy-dns modules instead; there are over 50 to choose from already. They are more flexible, compile much leaner, and are easier to implement and support. If yours is not supported it can be easily implemented. Sponsors at or above the Business tier can request to have their provider implemented for free.
• On-demand TLS: The ask option in the JSON has been deprecated in favor of a permission module (Caddyfile unchanged) (#6055), and Caddyfile support for permission modules is added (6a02999)
• Admin API: Etag (used for concurrency control) is now a header, not a trailer. This is less efficient, but still virtually no clients properly implement trailer support.
• For consistency, the basicauth Caddyfile directive has been renamed to basic_auth (#6092), and skip_log has been renamed to log_skip. The old names will continue to work for now, with a deprecation warning in the logs. (#6066).
• The basic_auth handler no longer supports scrypt (deprecated for nearly two years) (#6091)
• The forwarded option has been deprecated for a long time and has now been removed from the remote_ip matcher. Use the client_ip matcher instead. (#6085)
• Reverse proxy: The buffer_requests, buffer_responses, and max_buffer_size settings have been removed after being deprecated for 14 months. Use request_buffers and response_buffers instead if you need buffering.
• Go API: If you called caddy.Context.AppIfConfigured(), it now returns an error, as part of a bug fix. (#6292)

Notable changes:

• acme_server: Configurable allow/deny policies (#5796)
• acme_server: Specify allowed challenge types (#5794)
• caddyfile: Plugin authors can now specify a default ordering for directives, making manual ordering by users less necessary (#5865)
• cmd: The --adapter flag is not needed for config files ending with .caddyfile (#5919)
• encode: More media types are now compressed by default (#6081)
• encode: Modify ETag when encoding to comply with RFC 9110 section 8.8.3 (#5849)
• encode: Configurable compression level for zstd (#6140)
• handle_errors: Handling can now be filtered by response status code more easily (#5965)
• http: New fs directive can declare a file system plugin to use (#5057)
• http: Sensitive headers in the logs are now replaced with ["REDACTED"] instead of empty array. (#5669)
• http: Several improvements to size logging, websockets, flushing, 1xx statuses, and QUIC. (#6173, #6175, #6202, #6150, #6164, #6168)
• http: Can now write access logs for a hostname to more than one logger (#6088)
• http: The log_append handler can add fields to the access logs (#6066)
• http: Add uuid field to access logs when the {http.request.uuid} placeholder is used (#5859)
• http: Changed PROXY protocol libraries add TLV support (#5915)
• http: A new tracing mode writes each individual middleware handler to logs (#6313)
• http: Access logs use a different message ("unhandled") when an HTTP request is a no-op (#5182)
• file_server: The browse feature can now return a plaintext response (useful for terminals) (#6093)
• file_server: File listings can dereference symlinks if enabled (#5973)
• file_server: Directory listings now include total file size (#6003)
• file_server: Can use precomputed ETags from sidecar files (#6222)
• replacer: A new {file.*} global placeholder is available, where * is a path to a file on disk which contains a value (generally used for secrets) (#5463)
• reverse_proxy: HTTP/3 supported to backends (experimental) (#6312)
• reverse_proxy: Active health checks can now be configured with consecutive passes/fails to change status (#6154)
• reverse_proxy: A forward proxy can now be specified in config other than a single env var (#6114)
• reverse_proxy: Configurable trusted root CAs is now modular (#6065)
• reverse_proxy: SRV upstreams now support failovers/grace period with cache (#5832)
• reverse_proxy: TLS curves can now be configured (potential preparation for post-quantum) (#5851)
• root, rewrite: A * matcher token is no longer required in the Caddyfile (#5844)
• tls: Client authentication validation methods are now modular/pluggable (#6050)
• tls: Trusted CA providers are now modular (#5784)
• tls: New local_ip connection matcher (#6074)
• tls: Improvements and fixes when certificate managers are configured (#6229)
• tls: Refactor the On-Demand TLS ask endpoint into a permission module, making it pluggable (#6055)
• tls: Storage cleaning is now synced across instances that share the storage (#5940)
• tls: Supports ACME Renewal Information (ARI) draft spec, together with cert lifetime and OCSP/revocation status, to trigger certificate renewals
• uri: Can now perform structured query rewrites with uri query (#6120, #6165)

Changelog

Full Changelog: v2.7.6...v2.8.0

• ac0ad4d Upgrade acmeserver to github.com/go-chi/chi/v5 (#5913)
• 931656b acmeserver: add policy field to define allow/deny rules (#5796)
• e1aa862 acmeserver: support specifying the allowed challenge types (#5794)
• e6f46c8 acmeserver: Add sign_with_root for Caddyfile (#6345)
• 4a0492f admin: Make Etag a header, not a trailer (#6208)
• 1217449 admin: Use xxhash for etag (#6207)
• 7e2510e build(deps): bump ...

This release is obsolete. Please see the next release for the notes.

This release is obsolete. Please see the next release for the notes.

This release is obsolete. Please see the next release for the notes.

In this version we've made several fixes and enhancements with help from several contributors. Most changes are small, but some notable ones:

• The templates middleware is now officially extensible (experimentally). This means modules can add custom functions/actions for templates to execute.
• TLS storage cleaning is now synchronized across the cluster and remembered across restarts. This should greatly lower costs for expensive storage backends like DynamoDB.
• Placeholders are now evaluated in config for certificate loaders.
• Numerous bug fixes.

Thank you to everyone who contributed!

Changelog

• 65c489a Upgrade acmeserver to github.com/go-chi/chi/v5 (#5913)
• ae5e2d9 caddyfile: Fix variadic placeholder false positive when token contains : (#5883)
• db55da5 caddyhttp: Adjust scheme placeholder docs (#5910)
• df5edf6 caddytls: Context to DecisionFunc (#5923)
• 6d9a833 caddytls: Sync distributed storage cleaning (#5940)
• 11a082c cmd: Add newline character to version string in CLI output (#5895)
• 979c413 cmd: upgrade: resolve symlink of the executable (#5891)
• 6482070 core: Apply SO_REUSEPORT to UDP sockets (#5725)
• 15adb89 core: quic listener will manage the underlying socket by itself (#5749)
• 801ec75 fileserver: Add .m4v for browse template icon
• b809ed7 go.mod: CVE-2023-45142 Update opentelemetry (#5908)
• b4c7313 go.mod: Upgrade quic-go to v0.39.1
• 36fce3f go.mod: update quic-go version to v0.40.0 (#5922)
• ec2de22 httpcaddyfile: Fix TLS automation policy merging with get_certificate (#5896)
• f0ea489 httpcaddyfile: Remove port from logger names (#5881)
• 87f63b1 httpredirectlistener: Only set read limit for when request is HTTP (#5917)
• 16834d6 templates: Clarify include args docs, add .ClientIP (#5898)
• 0259853 templates: Delete headers on httpError to reset to clean slate (#5905)
• 2f7ceb5 templates: Offically make templates extensible (#5939)
• 908e956 tls: accept placeholders in string values of certificate loaders (#5963)

Full Changelog: v2.7.5...v2.7.6