Ubuntu Server Installing PHP 7 WITHOUT Apache

I'm trying to get my server re-setup as a Lemp stack

The issue I am now running into is installing PHP 7 without Apache, since nGinx will be my webserver.

So, I've added ppa:ondrej/php. ran apt-get update, and tried to install just php7.0 via apt-get install php7.0

--nodeps flag does not work, as I am on Ubuntu 15.10

And I am presented with:

The following extra packages will be installed:
  apache2 apache2-bin apache2-data apache2-utils libapache2-mod-php7.0 libapr1
  libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap liblua5.1-0 libqdbm14
  php-common php-readline php7.0 php7.0-cli php7.0-common php7.0-json
  php7.0-opcache php7.0-readline
Suggested packages:
  apache2-doc apache2-suexec-pristine apache2-suexec-custom php-pear
  php-user-cache
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  apache2 apache2-bin apache2-data apache2-utils libapache2-mod-php7.0 libapr1
  libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap liblua5.1-0 libqdbm14
  php php-common php-readline php7.0 php7.0-cli php7.0-common php7.0-json
  php7.0-opcache php7.0-readline

I do not want apache anywhere near my server, so how can I install php7 without it? Short of compiling from source (as this makes it difficult at best to keep it updated)

If you just request php7.0, it'll install Apache as default. Do apt-get install php7.0-fpm and it'll install as FPM instead, leaving something like nginx up to you.

Use the command:

sudo apt install php7.2 php7.2-common php7.2-cli php7.2-fpm

It will require the php7.2 dependencies in strict mode (WITHOUT apache2).

On Ubuntu 18.04 I managed to do this successfully with:

sudo apt-get install php7.2-cli

In Ubuntu 20.04, php 7.4 is the default. Thus, without adding any PPAs, all you need is

apt install php-fpm

This will bring in a few libraries, including php-cli, but NO apache-related things.

With the following steps you can install any PHP version you want, just replace 7.4 with your desired version.

Also I am suggesting to install the cli package because I assume you dont want to have fpm installed. Otherwise you can install php7.4-fpm instead.

Install ppa:ondrej/php repositories

sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php

Install PHP

sudo apt install php7.4-cli

You will get the following:

The following additional packages will be installed:
  php-common php7.4-common php7.4-json php7.4-opcache php7.4-readline