How to get a free SSL for cPanel hosting ?

What you’ll need

Be patient & follow all the 4 parts of this guide.

Steps:

Create a free account at cloudfare.com.
Enter your domain name
Choose the free $0 plan
Access the DNS settings page by logging in to your domain registrar’s website (GoDaddy, Namecheap etc.)
Replace your existing nameservers with the ones provided by cloudfare

You need to wait for few hours for the new DNS records to propagate.

Next, we need to get an “Origin Certificate” and “Private Key” from Cloudflare. Later, we will install these in the cPanel.

Now, go to your Cloudflare account dashboard, “SSL/TLS” > “Origin Server”, then click on “Create Certificate”.

Cloudfare will fill in the domain name & wildcard domain. Leave everything to the default & click on create to get certificates.

Now you should see something similar to this. Leave the format as PEM

In your cPanel hosting, go to “SSL/TLS” under the “SECURITY” section. Then click on Manage SSL sites as shown below.

Now choose the option which looks like this

Now copy the Origin Certificate from cloudfare & paste it under Certificate: (CRT) in your cPanel.

Next copy the Private Key from Cloudfare & paste it under Private Key (KEY) in your cPanel.

Finally click on Install Certificate to finalize installation of certificates.

You need not fill in anything under CABUNDLE since it will be fetched automatically.

Most importantly, you need to turn on the “Full (strict)” mode in your Cloudflare settings.

In your Cloudflare account, “SSL/TLS” > “Overview”, set the SSL/TLS encryption mode to “Full (strict)”.

In this guide you learnt how to obtain a SSL certificate for free from Cloudfare & use it to secure your cPanel based website.