How to set the maximum number of idle processes for Apache

Modify the httpd.conf, set in the inside:

Maxspareservers N

where n is an integer. So when the idle process exceeds n, the Apache main process kills the extra idle process while keeping the idle process in N, saving the system resources. If it is necessary to adjust this parameter at a very busy site in Apache, it is not a good idea to tune this parameter to a large majority at any time.

You can also set:

Minspareservers N

To limit the minimum number of idle processes to speed up the response.