Hosting a Wordpress Website on Amazon Lightsail

Are you looking to create a website for your business to find new customers on the internet? Or perhaps you’re part of an organization or community and would like to find people who have the same interest online.

1. Introduction

I’m Edward, and I’ve created several websites for businesses and online stores. I’ve used several platforms like Joomla, Wix, Magento, Shopify, and more. But for a business website, I prepare WordPress. WordPress is by far the most popular and used content management system. It’s open-source and free to install, deploy, and upgrade. It has a plugin system that makes it super flexible and with thousands of available free and premium themes and templates, it reduces the development cost and deployment time.

1.1 Prerequisites

• AWS account
• WordPress Theme (free, paid), get one from themeforest.com
• When searching, make sure to check the "Top Sellers" checkbox and set Rating to "4 stars and higher".
• Before buying, check the comments to see if the author is responsive and that the features you are looking for are supported.

2. Create a new WordPress instance using Amazon Lightsail

2.1 Login to your AWS account.

2.2 Under the Services Menu, click Amazon LightSail.

2.3 Under the Instances tab, click Create Instance.

2.4 Select the Instance location.

I normally select Ohio for testing as it's cheaper to host AWS services there.

2.5 Select the instance image. Pick Linux as it's cheaper than Windows.

2.6 Under the blueprint, app + os, select WordPress.

2.7 Under SSH Keypair, click Create New. You can use this keypair to login via SSH terminal later if needed.

2.8 Review the instance plan and select the cheapest tier. You can upgrade it later as the traffic to your website increases.

2.9 Give your instance a name and enter project tags as needed.

2.10 Create an instance.

3. Login to WordPress instance

*The default WordPress password is generated inside the instance. To get it we must first connect to the instance and copy the password.

3.1 In the Instances tab, you should be able to see the WordpressDemo instance that we have created. Open it.

3.2 Click, connect using SSH.

Inside the terminal type "ls" and hit the enter key. You should see a file named bitnami_application_password.

In the terminal, execute cat bitnami_application_password to see its content which is the WordPress password that we will use to log in later.

*This file can be removed once you have copied the password and successfully log in to WordPress.

Now that we have the password, close the ssh terminal.

3.3 Get the public IP of the instance. It's the same IP address in the image in step 3.1.

3.4 Open your browser and enter the URL: HTTP://<PUBLIC_IP>/wp-login.php. This is WordPress's login page and enter:

Username: user

Password: The password we got from step 3.2

And now, you should be able to see WordPress's admin interface.

4. Installing the theme of your choice.

Now, it's time to configure WordPress and install the theme of your choice. I will use a blog theme that I have bought from ThemeForest.

4.1 Inside WordPress admin, click Appearance / Themes.

4.2 Click Add New / Upload Theme.

4.3 Choose the theme package (zipped) that you have bought and click Install Now.

4.4 If the theme is successfully uploaded you should get a message to activate it.

4.5 If the theme has some dependency plugins, install them.

Now you have a RUNNING WordPress installation. Make sure to refer to your theme's documentation to set up your website base on their examples.

Your website provides information to your customers such as frequently asked questions, your services, and your cost. This saves yourself and your customer time and money.

If you need HELP, I'm offering my services to guide you in creating your website using WordPress https://czetsuya-tech.blogspot.com/p/business-and-e-commerce-website.html.