How To Redirect HTTP to HTTPS in NGINX

Last updated on July 16th, 2024 at 06:30 am

Today most websites around the world use HTTPS protocol. It is safe and secure and encrypts all data exchanged between client browser and server. One you can configured your website to be served over HTTPS then you need to redirect HTTP to HTTPs or enforce HTTPS on your website. In this article, we will look at how to redirect HTTP to HTTPS in NGINX.

Table of Contents

Why Redirect HTTP to HTTPS

When site administrators enable HTTPS on their website, they redirect all HTTP pages to be served via HTTPS. If you do not do this, then your web pages will be available via both HTTP and HTTPS. The very reason we use HTTPS to protect our website and prevent attackers from snooping into our data served over HTTP. If we do not redirect HTTP to HTTPS then it defeats the purpose of enabling SSL/TLS on our site. Secondly, if our web pages are available over both HTTP as well HTTPS then search engines may see it as duplicate content and push down our website in search results, or even penalize it completely. So it is essential to not only setup HTTPS for our website but also redirect HTTP to HTTPS afterwards.

How To Redirect HTTP to HTTPS in NGINX

Here are the steps to redirect HTTP to HTTPS in NGINX.

1. Backup NGINX Configuration File

We will need to modify NGINX configuration file or virtual host file, whichever works for you. Before you do that, it is necessary to take a backup of this file so that it is easy to recover in case something goes wrong.

$ sudo cp /etc/nginx/nginx.conf /etc/nginx/backup-nginx.conf

2. Open NGINX configuration file

Open terminal and run the following command to open NGINX server configuration file.

$ sudo vi /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

If you have configured separate virtual hosts for your website (e.g www.example.com), such as /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/website.conf then open its configuration with the following command

$ sudo vi /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/website.conf

Alternatively, you can also open the default virtual host configuration file.

$ sudo vi /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

3. Redirect HTTP to HTTPS

There are multiple ways to redirect HTTP to HTTPS. Before you redirect your site, it is important to understand the difference between URL rewrite vs redirect. Once you know it, you can choose to proceed as shown below.

Redirect all URL to HTTPS

Here is the server configuration if you want to redirect all URL to HTTPS.

server {
    listen 80 default_server;
    server_name _;
    return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
}

In the above code, we specify the following

Listen 80: Listen to all HTTP traffic on Port 80
Server_name _;: Match any hostname
Return 301: Indicates that this is a permanent redirect
https://$host$request_uri: Redirect to the HTTPS version of requested URL

The above configuration works for all websites hosted on your server mainly because ‘server_name _’ listens to all hostnames in request.

Redirect Specific Website or Domain

If you want to redirect a specific website or domain, modify server name directive as shown below. Replace example.com with your domain name.

server {
    listen 80 default_server;
    server_name example.com;
    return 301 https://example.com$request_uri;
}

The above config works for only example.com since we have mentioned ‘server_name example.com’.

Redirect Specific URL

If you want to redirect only a specific URL (e.g. index.html), add a rewrite statement in its location block, as shown below. Replace example.com with your domain name.

Location /index.html {
       rewrite ^/index.html$ https://example.com/index.html redirect;
}

4. Restart NGINX Server

Run the following command to check syntax of your updated config file.

$ sudo nginx -t

If there are no errors, run the following command to restart NGINX server.

$ sudo service nginx reload #debian/ubuntu
$ systemctl restart nginx #redhat/centos

5. Verify

Open web browser and request the HTTP version of any web page on your website. It should automatically redirect you to the HTTPS version. You can verify it by clicking on the address bar to see the full URL of final page after redirection.

Conclusion

Hopefully, this article will help you redirect HTTP to HTTPS in NGINX. As mentioned earlier, it is essential to setup SSL/TLS on your website so that all web pages can be served via HTTPS. Once you do this, you need to also redirect all HTTP pages to their HTTPS version. Otherwise, your web pages will be available via both HTTP as well as HTTPS and it will defeat the purpose of encrypting your web pages using HTTPS connection.

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Also read :
How to Configure Basic Authentication in NGINX
How to Install Let’s Encrypt in NGINX
Rewrite vs Redirect in NGINX
How to Create Custom 404 Page in NGINX
How to Limit Download Speed in NGINX