I want Netty webserver instead of tomcat in my spring-boot project with webflux

Question

I havent added web or data-rest dependencies to my spring-boot project so I expected Netty to be my default webserver but it still says tomcat started on port 8084 in my api gateway microservice.

This is my entire pom.xml file for my ApiGateway microservice

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 https://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
    <parent>
        <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-parent</artifactId>
        <version>3.2.3</version>
        <relativePath/> <!-- lookup parent from repository -->
    </parent>
    <groupId>com.fmsia2.api.gateway</groupId>
    <artifactId>ApiGateway</artifactId>
    <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <name>ApiGateway</name>
    <description>Demo project for Spring Boot</description>
    <properties>
        <java.version>17</java.version>
        <spring-cloud.version>2023.0.0</spring-cloud.version>
    </properties>
    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-webflux</artifactId>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter</artifactId>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter-gateway-mvc</artifactId>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter-netflix-eureka-client</artifactId>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.projectlombok</groupId>
            <artifactId>lombok</artifactId>
            <optional>true</optional>

        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-test</artifactId>
            <scope>test</scope>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>io.projectreactor</groupId>
            <artifactId>reactor-test</artifactId>
            <scope>test</scope>
        </dependency>
    </dependencies>
    <dependencyManagement>
        <dependencies>
            <dependency>
                <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
                <artifactId>spring-cloud-dependencies</artifactId>
                <version>${spring-cloud.version}</version>
                <type>pom</type>
                <scope>import</scope>
            </dependency>
        </dependencies>
    </dependencyManagement>

    <build>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
                <artifactId>spring-boot-maven-plugin</artifactId>
                <configuration>
                    <excludes>
                        <exclude>
                            <groupId>org.projectlombok</groupId>
                            <artifactId>lombok</artifactId>
                        </exclude>
                    </excludes>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>

</project>

This is my application.yml file

server:
  port : 8084
spring:
  application:
    name : API-GATEWAY

eureka:
  instance:
    prefer-ip-address : true
  client:
    fetchRegistry : true
    registerWithEureka : true
    serviceUrl :
      defaultZone : http://localhost:8761/eureka

I added the exclude dependency tag given below to spring-boot-starter-web-flux but it still shows tomcat started on 8084. This is how I tried to exclude the tomcat dependency.

         <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-webflux</artifactId>
            <exclusions>
                <!-- Exclude the Tomcat dependency -->
                <exclusion>
                    <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
                    <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-tomcat</artifactId>
                </exclusion>
            </exclusions>
        </dependency>

Answer 1

To enable netty you have to use Reactive Gateway in your pom.xml file instead of the mvc gateway

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 https://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
    <parent>
        <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-parent</artifactId>
        <version>3.2.3</version>
        <relativePath/> <!-- lookup parent from repository -->
    </parent>
    <groupId>com.fmsia2.api.gateway</groupId>
    <artifactId>ApiGateway</artifactId>
    <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <name>ApiGateway</name>
    <description>Demo project for Spring Boot</description>
    <properties>
        <java.version>17</java.version>
        <spring-cloud.version>2023.0.0</spring-cloud.version>
    </properties>
    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-webflux</artifactId>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter</artifactId>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
      <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
      <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter-gateway</artifactId>
    </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter-netflix-eureka-client</artifactId>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.projectlombok</groupId>
            <artifactId>lombok</artifactId>
            <optional>true</optional>

        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-test</artifactId>
            <scope>test</scope>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>io.projectreactor</groupId>
            <artifactId>reactor-test</artifactId>
            <scope>test</scope>
        </dependency>
    </dependencies>
    <dependencyManagement>
        <dependencies>
            <dependency>
                <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
                <artifactId>spring-cloud-dependencies</artifactId>
                <version>${spring-cloud.version}</version>
                <type>pom</type>
                <scope>import</scope>
            </dependency>
        </dependencies>
    </dependencyManagement>

    <build>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
                <artifactId>spring-boot-maven-plugin</artifactId>
                <configuration>
                    <excludes>
                        <exclude>
                            <groupId>org.projectlombok</groupId>
                            <artifactId>lombok</artifactId>
                        </exclude>
                    </excludes>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>

</project>