I think I have a bit of a mess here. I have my vue app running in my localhost environment. I want to deploy to a server I have hired. Which are the steps to accomplish this?
I have installed nodejs and npm on the server. At a first glance I tried to go the way I always did when using php, running nodejs app through apache server but it seems it is not the best option from what I read. In my local machine I run:
npm run serve
to start a server to run my vue app locally. Should I do same thing on my remote server? Are there better options?
Should I do same thing on my remote server?
Definitely no.
Notice in your package.json file you should have a script called "build", i.e. you can execute it with the command:
$ npm run build
Once executed, it should compile your Vue project and place the resulting files in a dist folder at the root of your project.
Notice that these files are plain HTML, JS (for browser, since Vue is only for front end) and CSS (plus any of your project assets if applicable).
Since you are familiar with PHP, you should know what to do with those files. Should your project be "simple" and not require backend services (like AJAX, REST, etc.), you can actually serve them on a simple server (no need for PHP, Node, etc.).
Otherwise, you should have plenty tutorials and resources online explaining how to publish those files on a simple server.