Apache cannot be started with the error “(98)Address already in use: make_sock:

[rohitj]

Apache cannot be started with the error “(98)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address [::]:443 no listening sockets available, shutting down

First of all make sure that the “Listen” directive is specified only once in the Apache configuration for one port. Check the httpd.conf and conf.d/* files in order to find it

Next, try to determine which process uses the port with the following command:

/usr/sbin/lsof -i | grep http
httpd 24717 apache 4u IPv6 9672930 TCP *:https (LISTEN)

This command shows that the “TCP *:https ” port is used by “httpd” process with PID 24717.

Such a problem may occur if Apache failed to stop properly. You need to kill this process and start Apache again. If you see that some another program uses the 443 port, you need to find from where it was
started and determine what it is because it could be a malicious script.

Run:

cat /proc/24717/cmdline
/usr/sbin/httpd-kgraceful

to find a command line with which this process was started. (24717 is the process’ PID).

Then kill the process.