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Frequently Asked Questions

Installing Third-Party SSLs on cPanel Accounts

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Last Updated: June 25, 2015 10:17 AM

Our cPanel accounts (shared hosting and servers) support SSL certificates from us (which we install for shared hosting customers), as well as third-party vendors (which you must install yourself).

Here's the process for the third-party SSL cert installation:

  1. Get a Dedicated IP Address (Shared hosting only) - Though you don't need a dedicated IP address to install an SSL on your cPanel account, having one ensures all visitors can successfully establish an SSL connection. For more information, see Adding or Removing a Dedicated IP Address from Your Hosting Account.
  2. Generate a CSR — You must provide the company providing your SSL certificate a certificate signing request (CSR) from your cPanel shared hosting account.
  3. Upload and install your SSL certificate — After receiving the SSL certificate, you need to upload it to your shared hosting account, and then "turn it on" for the site you want to secure.

Generating a CSR

To complete these steps, you need to have set up your cPanel account and already added the domain name you want to secure with an SSL certificate.

To Generate a CSR

  1. Log in to cPanel (Shared Hosting/Server).
  2. In the Security section, click SSL/TLS Manager.
  3. Under Certificate Signing Requests (CSR), click Generate, view, or delete SSL certificate signing requests.
  4. Complete the fields in the Generate a New Certificate Signing Request (CSR) section, and then click Generate.

Your certificate signing request displays in the Encoded Certificate Signing Request section.

To get your SSL certificate, you need to provide this CSR to the company issuing the certificate.

Once they've issued the certificate, they'll provide you a CRT file, which is your SSL certificate.

Uploading and Installing Your Certificate

To complete these steps, you need to have the CRT file provided to you by the company who issued your SSL certificate.

To Upload Your Certificate

  1. Log in to cPanel (Shared Hosting/Server).
  2. In the Security section, click SSL/TLS Manager.
  3. Under Certificates (CRT), click Generate, view, upload, or delete SSL certificates.
  4. Use the Upload Certificate section to upload the CRT file from your local machine, and then click Upload Certificate.

To Activate Your Certificate

  1. In the Certificates on Server section, in the section for the domain you want to use, click (Install).
  2. From the Domain menu, make sure you select the domain you want to secure.
  3. Click Install Certificate.

That's it! To make sure your SSL is working, you can check it at SSL Shopper.

Technical Info

Unlike some of our other hosting platforms, you do not need a dedicated IP address to have an SSL certificate on our cPanel shared hosting accounts. This is because it uses the Server Name Indication (SNI) protocol. However, not all browsers support SNI, which means that without a dedicated IP address, some users will not be able to successfully establish a connection over SSL.