cPanel hosting is perfect for those who are looking for an easy to use control panel to manage their websites. Its tools allow you to create web hosting & email and so much more with just a few clicks. Because the script takes care of everything server side, you can manage everything via the control panel in a browser.
Instance setup
First you need to log into your Civo account, select 'Instances' and then choose 'Create instance'. cPanel requires CentOS 6 and above and we're going to be using CentOS 6 in this guide.
You'll need to select the following configuration:
- Hostname:
cpanel.yourdomain.com - Instance:
1 - Size:
Small - OS Image:
CentOS 6 - Initial user:
root - Network:
default - Firewall:
default - SSH Key:
SSH
The latest version of cPanel (as of Dec 2018) recommends the following spec, which a Civo Small instance covers
CPU: 1.1GHZ
RAM: 2GB
Disk: 40GB
Installing cPanel
With your instance set-up, you now need to log into the box via SSH:
You first need to SSH into your instance:
ssh root@ip.address
You then need to run the cPanel install script. The best way to get the latest script url and also set-up your trial license is to go to https://cpanel.net/products/trial/ and enter your email address in the form. This will then register your email address for the 15 day trial as well as send you an email with the command.
If you want to register the trial license at a later date, you can just use the command below.
cd /home && curl -o latest -L https://securedownloads.cpanel.net/latest && sh latest
Set-up
Once the script has completed (the fastest I've seen this has been 55 minutes!), you'll then see the post-install output message which will look like this:
2018-12-06 08:58:21 285 ( INFO): cPanel install finished in 68 minutes and 39 seconds!
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): Congratulations! Your installation of cPanel & WHM 11.76 is now complete. The next step is to configure your server.
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): Before you configure your server, ensure that your firewall allows access on port 2087.
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): On RHEL, CentOS, and CloudLinux systems, execute /scripts/configure_firewall_for_cpanel to accomplish this.
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): After ensuring that your firewall allows access on port 2087, you can configure your server.
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): 1. Open your preferred browser
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): 2. Type https://ip.address:2087 in the address bar
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): 3. Enter the word root in the Username text box
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): 4. Enter your root password in the Password text box
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): 5. Click the Login button
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): Visit https://go.cpanel.net/whminit for more information about first-time configuration of your server.
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): Visit http://support.cpanel.net or https://go.cpanel.net/whmfaq for additional support
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO):
2018-12-06 08:58:21 1264 ( INFO): Thank you for installing cPanel & WHM 11.76!
2018-12-06 08:58:25 1142 ( WARN): !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2018-12-06 08:58:25 1143 ( WARN): Your system kernel may have been updated.
2018-12-06 08:58:25 1144 ( WARN): Current kernel (3.10.0-327.28.3.el7.x86_64) has been changed to: 3.10.0-957.1.3.el7.x86_64
2018-12-06 08:58:25 1145 ( WARN): Before rebooting the system, please ensure that the installed kernel version is compatible with your deployment.
2018-12-06 08:58:25 1155 ( WARN): !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This will give you further instructions on how to log onto the control panel via a browser. If you have not set up your domain names to point to your server IP via DNS, but want to, we have this easy to follow guide https://www.civo.com/api/dns.
The instructions automatically use your private IP beginning with 10, but you need to actually access it on the public IP listed for your instance
The next step is to configure the firewall on the instance to allow access on port 2087 which is the port used to access the admin side of cPanel. This is done by running the following command:
/scripts/configure_firewall_for_cpanel
As we have set up our instance with an SSH key and not a password, we'll need to set-up a password for 'root' to gain access to the control panel. If you chose to set it up with a password or as another user, please skip this step.
passwd root
Set-up wizard
Now that everything is installed, you need to go to your browser and type http://your.ip.address:2087 and log in using the username 'root' and your server password.
You'll notice that this screen has the WHM logo. WHM is the account management panel which allows the admin to manage customer accounts. cPanel is the site manager panel, used for individual accounts. At the bottom of this guide, we'll show you how to set up an in individual user account.
Follow the on screen instructions, ensuring you set up the correct nameservers for your server.
Once installed, you'll get access to all the features that cPanel offers. The install script picks up the Civo private network address, so we just need to update that to be the public IP address and we're good to go. Go to Basic WebHost Manager Setup and find the Basic Config options and update the IPv4 address as well as ensuring eth0 is selected.
Once the public IP has been set you can then just create a new user by selecting 'Create a New account' and follow the on-screen instructions
And that's it! The script does the heavy lifting on installing the cPanel software and you just need to follow the set-up wizard in your browser to configure it to your domain.
