Overview

Having a secure, encrypted website (shown by the padlock icon and https:// in your browser) is essential. It builds trust with your visitors and is a key factor in your Google search ranking. In the past, this required you to buy and manually install an SSL certificate. Let’s Encrypt is a free, automated, and open certificate authority that completely simplifies this process.

With Let’s Encrypt you can easily generate and install a free, browser-trusted SSL certificate. Best of all, your control panel (like cPanel, Plesk, InterWorx, or Cloud Sites) has built-in tools that use Let’s Encrypt to automatically install and renew your certificates for you. This means your site stays secure, and you don’t have to worry about complicated configurations or renewal dates.

Parameters / Features

Let’s Encrypt is designed to be as simple and automated as possible. Here are its key features and what they mean for you.

Feature	What It Means for You
Free of Charge	You can secure all of your websites with a fully trusted SSL certificate without paying any certificate fees.
Automated Renewal	Your control panel (using features like WHM / cPanel’s AutoSSL or Plesk’s Let’s Encrypt extension) automatically renews your certificate before it expires. You don’t have to track expiration dates or manually install a new one.
Domain Validated (DV)	Let’s Encrypt issues Domain Validated (DV) certificates. This means it verifies that you actually control your domain name before issuing the certificate. This verification is almost always handled automatically by your control panel.
Short 90-Day Lifetime	The certificates are valid for 90 days. This shorter cycle improves security by reducing the time a compromised certificate could be used. Because renewal is fully automated, you won’t even notice this happening.
Trusted by Browsers	Your visitors will see the ‘padlock’ icon in all modern browsers (like Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge) and will not see a “Not Secure” warning.

Certificate Limits

Let’s Encrypt has rate limits to prevent abuse. The most common limit is 50 new certificates per registered domain, per week. This limit is very high and does not affect most users. You can read all the current rate limits on the Let’s Encrypt website.

Examples

You will almost always use Let’s Encrypt through an integration in your hosting control panel. You do not need to use any special commands, unless you are on our self-managed options.

Find Let’s Encrypt installation instructions below:

Enabling Let’s Encrypt for AutoSSL on WHM-Based Servers
How to set up Let’s Encrypt
Install Let’s Encrypt SSL in Cloud Sites
Use Let’s Encrypt for SSL Encryption with cPanel
Use Let’s Encrypt for SSL Encryption with Plesk
How to Enable Let’s Encrypt (managed WooCommerce or WordPress )

Common Use Cases

Securing Your Blog or Business Site: The most common use is to add a free, trusted SSL to your website to remove the “Not Secure” warning.
Improving Your SEO: Google and other search engines favor secure https:// sites, so installing an SSL can help improve your search ranking.
Securing Login Pages: You can use Let’s Encrypt to secure your website’s login page (like WordPress admin) or even your control panel login.
Providing SSLs for Your Clients: If you are a reseller, you can use Let’s Encrypt to provide a free SSL to all of your customers automatically.
Securing E-commerce Checkouts: Let’s Encrypt provides the same level of encryption as paid DV certificates, making it suitable for securing checkout pages on small e-commerce sites.

Links to API / CLI docs

For most users, all interaction with Let’s Encrypt will be through a control panel. For advanced users or those on a self-managed server, the Certbot tool is the official command-line client.

Let’s Encrypt Homepage – The official website for the Let’s Encrypt project.
How It Works – A high-level overview of how the certificate issuance and validation process works.
Let’s Encrypt FAQ – Official answers to frequently asked questions.
Certbot – The official command-line tool for requesting and renewing Let’s Encrypt certificates (for advanced, self-managed users).

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Yes. Let’s Encrypt provides the exact same level of standard encryption (256-bit) as a paid certificate. It effectively protects customer data during checkout. However, larger e-commerce businesses often prefer paid certificates because they include a financial warranty and higher levels of identity validation (OV or EV), which Let’s Encrypt does not offer.

Let’s Encrypt uses a short lifetime to improve security. If a certificate key is ever compromised, it can only be used for a short time. Because the renewal process is automated by your control panel (checking daily and renewing about 30 days before expiration), you generally do not need to worry about this short timeframe.

The main differences are Validation Level and Warranty.

Paid SSL: Can offer Organization Validation (OV) or Extended Validation (EV), which proves your legal business identity. Paid certificates also come with liability warranties ranging from $10,000 to $1.75 million.
Let’s Encrypt: Offers only Domain Validation (DV)—it proves you own the domain. It has no warranty.

Yes, Let’s Encrypt supports Wildcard SSLs (e.g., *.example.com). However, generating a Wildcard usually requires DNS validation rather than file-based validation. Depending on your hosting control panel, this might be harder to automate than a standard certificate.

The most common reason for failure is DNS issues. If your domain name does not point to the server where the certificate is installed, or if you have a firewall blocking the validation request, Let’s Encrypt cannot verify your ownership and will not renew the certificate.

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