Upgrade Apache to Latest Version on Ubuntu 20.04

Updating Operating System

First, update your Ubuntu operating system to make sure all existing packages are up to date. Also please be careful before system update. You can skip this steps if you are not sure if it will break your current application.

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y

Installing Latest Apache

Before upgrading, you should check the current version of Apache 2 webserver you have currently running.

apache2 -v

output

Server version: Apache/2.4.29 (Ubuntu)

Adding Apache PPA

The first step in upgrading your Ubuntu 20.04 Apache webserver to the latest version is adding the PPA by Ondřej Surý’s. For those unfamiliar, Ondřej is the maintainer for PHP on Debian and maintains the latest Apache PPA for Ubuntu along with Nginx and PHP.

To add the PPA, use the following command in your terminal.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/apache2 -y && sudo apt update

This will automatically add the PPA and refresh to update your repository list.

Upgrade Apache from PPA

Now, you can run the apt package manager install command, which will upgrade Apache 2 web server as follows

sudo apt install apache2

Alternatively, you can use the update and upgrade as follows.

sudo apt update

If an Apache 2 upgrade is available the run the following.

sudo apt upgrade apache2 -y

Verify version and Apache status

Once the upgrade is complete, check the version of Apache you are using now with the following command.

apache2 -v

output

Server version: Apache/2.4.51 (Ubuntu)

As you can see, the version has changed from the Ubuntu default repository version Apache 2 build is 2.4.41 to the latest Apache build provided by the PPA by Ondřej Surý build 2.4.51.

Lastly, verify the status by using the following systemctl command.

sudo systemctl status apache2

Congratulations, you have upgraded Apache to the latest version on offer.