It seems a simple apt-get remove apache2 does not completely remove apache2 as I can still see it on one of the processes when running top. How does one remove apache2 completely on his ubuntu server?

It's not removed indeed:

~# which apache2
/usr/sbin/apache2
~# whereis apache2
apache2: /usr/sbin/apache2 /etc/apache2 /usr/lib/apache2 /usr/share/apache2 /usr/share/man/man8/apache2.8.gz

But when I do apt-get remove apache2 again:

# apt-get remove apache2
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Package apache2 is not installed, so not removed
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.

2

8 Answers

apache2 is a metapackage that just selects other packages. If you installed apache by installing that package, you just need to run this to clean up the automatically selected packages:

sudo apt autoremove

If that doesn't work, you might have installed one of the dependents manually. You can target all the apache2- packages from space and nuke the lot:

sudo apt remove apache2.*

For future reference, to find out which package a binary is from, you can run this:

dpkg -S `which apache2`

I'd expect that to come back with apache2.2-bin (at the time of writing).

10

Follow these steps to remove the apache2 service using Terminal:

1. First stop the apache2 service if it is running with: sudo service apache2 stop

2. Now remove and cleanup all the apache2 packages with:

   sudo apt-get purge apache2 apache2-utils apache2.2-bin apache2-common
   //or
   sudo apt-get purge apache2 apache2-utils apache2-bin apache2.2-common

3. Finally, run sudo apt-get autoremove just in case any other cleanup in needed

You can do the following two tests to confirm apache has been removed:

1. which apache2 - should return a blank line
2. sudo service apache2 start - should return apache2: unrecognized service

4

A very simple and straightforward way that worked for me is as follows:

1. Stop apache2.

   sudo service apache2 stop

2. Uninstall Apache2 and its dependent packages.

   sudo apt-get purge apache2 apache2-utils apache2.2-bin apache2-common

3. Use autoremove option to get rid of other dependencies.

   sudo apt-get autoremove

4. Check whether there are any configuration files that have not been removed.

   whereis apache2

5. If you get a response as follows apache2: /etc/apache2 remove the directory and existing configuration files.

   sudo rm -rf /etc/apache2 

_{Source: How to uninstall and remove Apache2 on Ubuntu or Debian by Dan Nanni}

1

Remove apache2 from the Ubuntu

To remove totally from your localhost

1st check the current status using

service apache2 status

if it's active (running)write next

sudo apt remove apache2*

Say yes using y.

First check if you are using right package name, IMO correct package name is : apache2.x-common

If you want to completely remove the package including config files then try:

 dpkg --purge apache2.2-common

Take time to check if you are using the different package apache2.2-bin for Ubuntu 16.04 the latest is apache2.4-bin

sudo apt-get purge apache2 apache2-utils apache2.4-bin apache2.4-common

I tried the other answers here but this is the most complete solution I have found which worked for me:

$ sudo service apache2 stop
$ sudo apt-get purge apache2 apache2-utils apache2.2-bin apache2-common
$ sudo apt-get autoremove

The output of the below command will provide you with information the installed package software, version, architecture and short description about the package. grep command is used to find the apache package

$ sudo dpkg --get-selections | grep apache | cut -f 1
$ sudo apt-get remove --purge <package name from the previous command output>
$ sudo whereis apache
$ sudo rm -rf <directory/file path from the previous command output>

see

For a Debian based OS, like Ubuntu, use:

sudo apt remove --purge apache2
sudo apt autoremove -y

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