I recently migrated or moved this blog to HTTPS/SSL in light of Google announcement of using https as a ranking signal.

Chrome (the most popular web browser) currently indicates HTTP connections with a neutral indicator. This doesn’t reflect the true lack of security for HTTP connections. Starting January 2017, Chrome 56 will label HTTP pages with password or credit card form fields as “not secure,” given their particularly sensitive nature. Now is a good time to migrate.

In this post, i will be showing us how i migrated this blog to HTTPS using a free SSL/TLS Certificate from Let’s Encrypt.

Getting SSL/TLS Certificate

There are lots of SSL certificate vendors and tutorials on migrating WordPress to SSL online. I even had one written for the fine folks at Designmodo.

I opted to use Let’s Encrypt because it is free and the cPanel that comes with my host has it built-in. If you’re on a shared hosting, you should have it too on your cPanel.

Login to cPanel and click Lets Encrypt SSL menu item under Security widget section.

Locate your website and click the issue link beneath the Actions column.

And then click the Issue button.

Migrating WordPress to HTTPS

Having issued and installed a certificate for your domain on the server level, next is to implement HTTPS for WordPress. The setup is a bit involved, hence i opted for Really Simple SSL plugin to handle all of that.

Install and activate the plugin. You will now see a notice asking you to enable SSL. Click it and log in again.

Then What?

You need to inform Google and Bing (the two search engine giant) about the change by re-adding your website to Google search console and Bing webmaster tool but this time with https:// URL prefix. Perhaps you will find this this guide handy.

La Fin!