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[Home](https://www.msaied.com/public) 2. / 3. [Articles](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles) 4. / 5. Laravel Reverb WebSocket Scaling: Channels, Presence, and Horizontal Deployment Laravel Reverb WebSocket Scaling: Channels, Presence, and Horizontal Deployment ================================================================================ Move beyond a single Reverb node. Learn how to scale Laravel Reverb horizontally with Redis pub/sub, configure presence channels correctly, and avoid the subtle pitfalls that only appear under real production load. ![](https://cdn.msaied.com/01M22N44A70A5MC2S599JP0MPH.webp) [Mohamed Said](https://www.msaied.com/public#person) Published 11 Jul 2026 · Updated 11 Jul 2026 · 4 min read ShareCopy linkCopied ![Laravel Reverb WebSocket Scaling: Channels, Presence, and Horizontal Deployment](https://cdn.msaied.com/410/2698f47a7daff990e9807996fe0f493c.png) On this page +1. [Why a Single Reverb Node Breaks Under Load](#why-a-single-reverb-node-breaks-under-load) 2. [The Redis Pub/Sub Bridge](#the-redis-pubsub-bridge) 3. [Presence Channel State Across Nodes](#presence-channel-state-across-nodes) 4. [Load Balancer Configuration](#load-balancer-configuration) 5. [Supervisor and Process Management](#supervisor-and-process-management) 6. [Health Checks and Observability](#health-checks-and-observability) 7. [Key Takeaways](#key-takeaways) Why a Single Reverb Node Breaks Under Load ------------------------------------------ Laravel Reverb is a first-party WebSocket server that integrates tightly with Laravel's broadcasting system. A single node works perfectly in development and handles modest traffic, but the moment you add a second application server — or run Reverb behind a load balancer — you hit a fundamental problem: **WebSocket connections are stateful and sticky to one process**. Client A connects to node 1. Client B connects to node 2. When your application broadcasts an event, only the node that received the HTTP request knows about it. Without a shared message bus, half your users miss the event. The Redis Pub/Sub Bridge ------------------------ Reverb ships with a Redis scaling driver that solves this with a publish/subscribe bus. Every Reverb node subscribes to the same Redis channel. When any node receives a broadcast, it publishes to Redis; every other node picks it up and pushes it to its own connected clients. Enable it in `config/reverb.php`: ```php 'scaling' => [ 'driver' => 'redis', 'connection' => env('REVERB_SCALING_CONNECTION', 'default'), ], ``` Then make sure your `redis` connection in `config/database.php` points at the same Redis instance (or cluster) that all Reverb nodes share. A dedicated Redis database index keeps Reverb traffic isolated: ```php 'reverb_scaling' => [ 'url' => env('REDIS_URL'), 'host' => env('REDIS_HOST', '127.0.0.1'), 'password' => env('REDIS_PASSWORD'), 'port' => env('REDIS_PORT', '6379'), 'database' => env('REVERB_REDIS_DB', '1'), ], ``` Reference it: `REVERB_SCALING_CONNECTION=reverb_scaling`. Presence Channel State Across Nodes ----------------------------------- Presence channels track *who is online*. In a single-node setup, that state lives in memory. Across nodes, each node only knows about its own connections — so `channel:here` events become inconsistent. Reverb stores presence membership in Redis when the scaling driver is active. The key pattern is `reverb:presence:{channel}`. You should **never** query this key directly; instead rely on the `here`, `joining`, and `leaving` client events. What you *do* need to ensure is that your Redis instance has enough memory and that you set a sensible TTL policy — presence keys are cleaned up on disconnect, but a crashed node can leave orphaned entries until the key expires. Force a short key TTL in your Reverb config: ```php 'presence' => [ 'timeout' => 120, // seconds before a stale member is evicted ], ``` Load Balancer Configuration --------------------------- WebSocket connections require HTTP Upgrade. Most load balancers need explicit configuration: ```nginx upstream reverb { least_conn; server reverb1:8080; server reverb2:8080; } server { listen 443 ssl; location /app/ { proxy_pass http://reverb; proxy_http_version 1.1; proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade; proxy_set_header Connection "Upgrade"; proxy_set_header Host $host; proxy_read_timeout 3600s; } } ``` Note `least_conn` rather than round-robin. WebSocket connections are long-lived, so round-robin will pile connections onto whichever node happened to be first. `least_conn` distributes active connections more evenly. Supervisor and Process Management --------------------------------- Each Reverb node should run under Supervisor with restart-on-failure: ```ini [program:reverb] command=php /var/www/artisan reverb:start --host=0.0.0.0 --port=8080 autostart=true autorestart=true stopwaitsecs=10 stdout_logfile=/var/log/reverb.log ``` Set `stopwaitsecs` high enough for in-flight connections to drain gracefully. Reverb sends a close frame to clients on SIGTERM; clients with reconnect logic will re-connect to another node transparently. Health Checks and Observability ------------------------------- Reverb exposes a `/apps/{appId}/channels` REST endpoint (authenticated with your app secret) that returns active channel counts. Wire this into your uptime monitor or Prometheus scraper to alert on node divergence — if two nodes report wildly different channel counts, your Redis pub/sub bridge may have silently failed. Key Takeaways ------------- - Enable the Redis scaling driver so all Reverb nodes share a pub/sub bus. - Use a dedicated Redis database index to isolate Reverb traffic. - Presence channel state is stored in Redis automatically; set a `presence.timeout` to evict stale members from crashed nodes. - Configure your load balancer with `Upgrade` headers and `least_conn` balancing. - Run each node under Supervisor with graceful shutdown via `stopwaitsecs`. - Monitor channel counts per node via the Reverb REST API to catch pub/sub failures early. - [laravel](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles?search=laravel) - [reverb](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles?search=reverb) - [websockets](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles?search=websockets) - [redis](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles?search=redis) - [broadcasting](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles?search=broadcasting) Frequently asked questions --------------------------- Do I need a Redis cluster, or will a single Redis instance work for Reverb scaling?A single Redis instance is sufficient for most deployments. Redis pub/sub is extremely fast and the message volume from WebSocket broadcasts is typically low. Only move to a Redis cluster if your Redis instance itself becomes a bottleneck, which is rare before thousands of concurrent connections. What happens to connected clients when a Reverb node restarts?Reverb sends a WebSocket close frame on SIGTERM. Laravel Echo and Pusher-compatible clients have built-in reconnect logic, so clients will automatically reconnect to another available node within a few seconds. The presence channel will emit a `leaving` event for the disconnected client and a `joining` event when they reconnect. Can I run Reverb behind AWS ALB or Cloudflare?Yes. AWS ALB supports WebSocket upgrades natively — enable sticky sessions only if you cannot use the Redis scaling driver. Cloudflare proxies WebSockets on paid plans; ensure your Cloudflare timeout settings exceed your expected connection duration, as the default 100-second idle timeout will drop long-lived connections. ![Mohamed Said](https://cdn.msaied.com/01M22N44A70A5MC2S599JP0MPH.webp)About the author ---------------- [Mohamed Said](https://www.msaied.com/public#person)Senior Backend Engineer specializing in Laravel, scalable SaaS platforms, APIs, and cloud infrastructure. I build secure, high-performance web applications that help businesses grow. [About](https://www.msaied.com/public#about) [GitHub ↗](https://github.com/EG-Mohamed) [LinkedIn ↗](https://www.linkedin.com/in/msaiedm/) [WhatsApp ↗](https://wa.me/201094619204) [Email Address ↗](mailto:hello@msaied.com) [My CV ↗](https://drive.google.com/file/u/0/d/1MF20IPRJyzfy32mhEutjL5EpSls0w2Q8/view) [Previous articleLaravel Enum Casts, Backed Enums, and Value Semantics in PHP 8.3](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles/laravel-enum-casts-backed-enums-and-value-semantics-in-php-83) [Next articlePractical RAG in Laravel: pgvector, Embeddings, and Retrieval Pipelines](https://www.msaied.com/public/articles/practical-rag-in-laravel-pgvector-embeddings-and-retrieval-pipelines-1) On this page ------------- 1. [Why a Single Reverb Node Breaks Under Load](#why-a-single-reverb-node-breaks-under-load) 2. [The Redis Pub/Sub Bridge](#the-redis-pubsub-bridge) 3. [Presence Channel State Across Nodes](#presence-channel-state-across-nodes) 4. [Load Balancer Configuration](#load-balancer-configuration) 5. [Supervisor and Process Management](#supervisor-and-process-management) 6. [Health Checks and Observability](#health-checks-and-observability) 7. [Key Takeaways](#key-takeaways) ### Have a technical challenge? Tell me what you’re building. I reply within two working days. 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