1. Stop unused PHP versions (FPM pools)
2. Prevent PHP versions from starting on boot

When running PHP applications it's a common mistake to forget to turn off unused PHP versions. This mostly happens when you install a new PHP version and forget to uninstall or disable the previous PHP versions.

It is no problem to keep multiple PHP versions installed on your server. But it could be a problem to keep it running on your server. Likely this happens when using PHP FPM, which has a default www pool per PHP version that isn't turned off when it's not in use anymore.

So it could be running forerver and keeps precious server memory occupied.

#Stop unused PHP versions (FPM pools)

Stopping the processes for a PHP FPM pool is easy, using this command for your unneeded PHP version (e.g. 7.4):

sudo service php7.4-fpm stop

#Prevent PHP versions from starting on boot

To prevent the PHP version from starting when you reboot your server, disable the service all together:

sudo systemctl disable php7.4-fpm

Using Rocketeers you won't have this problem. When changing PHP versions, Rocketeers will detect which sites and applications are running which versions and will disable all unused versions on your server.