How to Set Up HTTPS on Your Site: A Simple Guide

As of July 2018, Google started marking your website as “not secure” for anyone visiting it using Google Chrome. If you don’t want to lose traffic, it’s a good idea to make sure SSL is set up on your site so people can visit it via HTTPS protocol.

Now is the time to set that up; here’s what you need to do.

Note: You may still see your site as “Not secure” after “successfully” installing an SSL certificate. See our troubleshooting tips at the end of this article for that.

Step 1: Grab Your SSL Certificate

According to the Google Developers blog , enabling HTTPS on your website doesn’t only protect the integrity of your data. HTTPS is also a requirement for many new browser features.Not only that, but it makes your visitors feel more secure whenever they visit your site. These are important reasons your site needs an SSL certificate .

Recently, if you open your website using a Chrome browser, you’ve probably seen that big, ugly “Not Secure” message in front of your URL.

That’s not a pleasant thing to see when you’ve invested so much of your time and effort into developing a great website for your visitors.

Before you run out and look for an SSL certificate to buy, make sure you already know where you stand with your current web host.

SSL is fairly simple to set up, but you need to follow the right procedure for your situation. If your web host already offers a free SSL solution, then don’t waste money buying a certificate.

You might also consider reconsidering your choice of web hosts The Best Web Hosting Services The Best Web Hosting Services Looking for the best web hosting service for your needs? Whether it's for a small blog or a major corporate website, here are our best recommendations. Read More .

These are typically the SSL certificate options you have to choose from.

Free SSL certificate from your existing web host. Get a free SSL certificate from services like Let’s Encrypt , Comodo , or Cloudflare . Purchase an SSL certificatefrom services like DigiCert , Namecheap , or GoDaddy .

SSL services that offer free SSL certificates often also offer paid ones.

The difference is that most free certificates need to be manually renewed. You can do thisvia a cron job How to Schedule Tasks in linux with Cron and Crontab How to Schedule Tasks in Linux with Cron and Crontab The ability to automate tasks is one of those futuristic technologies that is already here. Every Linux user can benefit from scheduling system and user tasks, thanks to cron, an easy-to-use background service. Read More , but that’s beyond the scope of this article.

Some web hosts actually offer free management of those cron jobs if you use a service like Let’s Encrypt. SiteGround is one host that does this.

Whichever option you go with, when you order a certificate you’ll see a page like the one below. Both the certificate and the key are a part of the package.

Copy both blocks of encrypted text and save them to a safe place.

Step 2: Install Your SSL Certificate

Most guides that describe how to install an SSL certificate will tell you that you have to have a dedicated IP. This means purchasing a more expensive dedicated hosting plan What Should You Be Looking for in a Web Host? What Should You Be Looking for in a Web Host? Whether you're creating a new website, or migrating an old one, you need to make sure you're getting the best deal possible from your chosen web host. Read More .

If you have such a plan, and you go into your account you’ll see that you have a dedicated IP associated with it.

If you have a shared hosting plan, where multiple websites share the same server, then you don’t have a dedicated IP that goes with your URL.

Does that mean you can’t install an SSL certificate without a dedicated hosting plan? No. Thanks to a technology called Server Name Indicator (SNI) , you can still install an SSL certificate for your site.

If you have a shared hosting plan, ask your web host whether they support SNI for SSL encryption.

To install your certificate, you’ll need to go into cPanel and click on SSL/TLS Manager .

You should see various options for managing SSL certificates.

To install your initial SSL certificate for HTTPS, choose the Install option.

You’ll see the option to choose the domain you’d like to install the certificate onto. Choose the correct domain from the dropdown box.

Next, paste the long encrypted certificate text that you copied when you purchased the certificate.

Then, scroll down and also paste the encrypted text for the Private Key that you copied when you bought the certificate.

Once you save, make sure to go into WordPress and refresh all c