How to Configure Nginx as an HTTPS Proxy Server?

Tue, 02 Jun 2026 16:03:57 +0000

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In previous article we could able to setup basic nginx server and server simple html page.

Now let's setup https for our nginx server.

Requirements

Before we start setting up https we should do the following:

Buy a domain name from any registrar.
Set up dns records to point to our server ip.
Setup Certificate for our domain name.
Install nginx on our server.
Set up nginx server to serve our website.

Buying Domain Name

We can buy domain name from any registrar like Namecheap, GoDaddy, etc.

It depends on which name it is and the charges will be around

Setting Up DNS Records

Once buy setup the dns records to point to our server ip.

Example:
For your server the ip address is [IP_ADDRESS].
And your domain name is [EMAIL_ADDRESS]

So, you need to set up a dns record to point to your server ip.

Setting up Certificate

Now let's setup certificate for our domain name.

example.com

so, we setup

sudo certbot --nginx -d `example.com` --email [EMAIL_ADDRESS] --agree-tos --no-eff-email

Here is simple workflow on how certificate is fetched and how

Key generation

The Certbot generates a private key and a CSR (Certificate Signing Request) entirely on your machine.

The private key is the core security guarantee.

HTTP-01 Challenge

Let's Encrypt needs to verify you actually control example.com. It sends Certbot a random token.

Certbot places it at:

/var/www/html/.well-known/acme-challenge/<random-token>

Nginx (already running on port 80) serves this file publicly.

Let's Encrypt fetches the token

LE makes a plain HTTP request to http://example.com/.well-known/acme-challenge/<token>.

If it gets the right response back, it's satisfied that you own the domain.

This is why DNS must be pointing to your server before you run Certbot — if the domain pointed elsewhere, LE would fetch the token from the wrong machine and the challenge would fail.

Certificate issued & saved

LE signs and returns your certificate.

Certbot saves four files to /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/:

File	What it is
`fullchain.pem`	Your cert + intermediate CA chain (this is what Nginx uses)
`privkey.pem`	Your private key (Nginx uses this too)
`cert.pem`	Just your cert alone
`chain.pem`	Just the CA chain alone

Nginx config is rewritten

Certbot patches your server block to add the listen 443 ssl lines and the cert paths, and adds a new server { listen 80; } block that redirects all HTTP traffic to HTTPS.

Then it reloads Nginx for you.

Setting up with nginx

Assuming your application running in local host 8090. and you are setting up https for your domain name example.com.

server {
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    server_name example.com;

    ssl_certificate     /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem;

    # All requests — public, no auth
    location / {
        proxy_pass http://localhost:8090;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https;
    }
}

Add to symlink to sites enabled

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/

Restarting nginx

sudo nginx -t && sudo systemctl reload nginx

Conclusion

We could get https for our domain name example.com.