🌐 Secure NGINX Web Server on AWS EC2 with Let's Encrypt SSL and Custom Domain

Setting up a secure web server is a foundational DevOps skill. In this post, you'll learn how to

✅ Launch an EC2 instance

✅ Set up NGINX with a custom Hello page

✅ Secure it with a free SSL certificate using Let's Encrypt

✅ Connect your domain using Route 53

🧰 Prerequisites

• AWS account


• A registered domain (Route 53, GoDaddy, etc.)


• PuTTY (Windows) or terminal (Linux/macOS)


• Basic Linux command-line knowledge

☁️ Step 1: Launch an EC2 Instance

1. Go to the AWS EC2 Dashboard


2. Click Launch Instance


3. Choose OS: Ubuntu 22.04 or Amazon Linux 2


4. Select instance type: t3.medium
   


5. Configure in a Public Subnet of a VPC


6. Enable inbound rules in the Security Group
   
   
   
   
   • TCP 22 (SSH)
   
   
   • TCP 80 (HTTP)
   
   
   • TCP 443 (HTTPS)
   
   
   
   


7. Download the .pem key pair

💻 Step 2: Connect via SSH using PuTTY (Windows)

1. 
   

   Open PuTTYgen

   
   
   
   
   
   • Load your .pem file
   
   
   • Click Save Private Key → this generates .ppk
   
   
   
   


2. 
   

   Open PuTTY

   
   
   
   
   
   • Host Name: ubuntu@your-ec2-ip
     
   
   
   • Go to Connection → SSH → Auth
   
   
   • Load the .ppk file
     
   
   
   • Click Open → You’re connected
   
   
   
   

🌍 Step 3: Point Domain to EC2

1. Go to Route 53 → Hosted Zones


2. Click Create Record
   
   
   
   
   • Type: A
     
   
   
   • Name: @ or www
     
   
   
   • Value: your EC2 IP
     
   
   
   
   

📌 Test: Visit http://yourdomain.com — NGINX default page should appear.

🔧 Step 4: Install NGINX + Hello Page

sudo apt update

sudo apt install nginx -y

echo "<h1>Hello from AWS + NGINX</h1>" | sudo tee /var/www/html/index.html

sudo systemctl restart nginx

Access it at http://yourdomain.com

🔐 Step 5: Add Free SSL with Let’s Encrypt

Install Certbot:

sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-nginx -y

Run Certbot for your domain:

sudo certbot --nginx -d yourdomain.com

Test auto-renewal:

sudo certbot renew --dry-run

🧠 Bonus: Editing the NGINX Config

sudo vim /etc/nginx/sites-available/default

Example Config:

server {

    listen 80;

    server_name yourdomain.com;



    root /var/www/html;

    index index.html;



    location / {

        try_files $uri $uri/ =404;

    }

}

Save and reload:

sudo systemctl reload nginx

📌 Project Structure

📂 /var/www/html/index.html       # Custom hello page

📂 /etc/nginx/sites-available     # NGINX site configs

🔐 SSL: Managed by Certbot

🌐 Domain: Managed via Route 53

📊 Architecture Diagram

🏁 Final Output

https://yourdomain.com

With NGINX serving your page securely over HTTPS

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