Overview
Production WordPress setup with separate DB, S3 media offloading, CloudFront CDN, Route 53 DNS, and ACM SSL certificate. This step-by-step guide provides exact commands, configuration files, and verification steps you can follow in your environment.
This tutorial is based on real production deployments and includes troubleshooting tips for common issues you may encounter during setup.
Prerequisites
- Cloud account with administrative access or equivalent IAM permissions
- CLI tools installed and configured (aws-cli / oci-cli / az-cli as applicable)
- SSH key pair generated for server access
- Basic networking knowledge (CIDR notation, DNS, TCP/IP ports)
- Terminal access (Linux/macOS Terminal or Windows PowerShell/WSL)
Step 1: Environment Preparation
Prepare your working environment by verifying CLI access, checking account quotas, and organizing resources into logical groups (compartments/resource groups/tags).
# Verify CLI is configured and authenticated
# Check your identity and account details
# Ensure required service limits are available
# Create resource group/compartment for this deploymentStep 2: Network Architecture Setup
Create the foundational network infrastructure: virtual network with appropriate CIDR range, public and private subnets across availability zones, internet gateway, NAT gateway, and route tables.
Design your network with security in mind: public subnets for internet-facing resources only, private subnets for application and database tiers, and strict security rules controlling inter-subnet traffic.
# Create virtual network (VPC/VCN/VNet)
# CIDR: 10.0.0.0/16 (65,536 IPs)
# Public subnet: 10.0.1.0/24 (load balancers, bastion)
# Private subnet: 10.0.2.0/24 (application servers)
# Database subnet: 10.0.3.0/24 (databases, storage)
# Create Internet Gateway for public subnet
# Create NAT Gateway for private subnet outbound access
# Configure route tables for each subnetStep 3: Security Configuration
Implement security controls at the network layer with firewalls/security groups, and at the identity layer with IAM roles and policies following least-privilege principles.
- Create security groups: allow only required ports from specific sources
- Create IAM roles for services (no hardcoded credentials)
- Enable encryption for data at rest and in transit
- Configure audit logging for all administrative actions
Step 4: Compute/Service Provisioning
Deploy the core compute resources or managed services required for wordpress on aws with ec2 and rds. Select appropriate instance types and configure with hardened OS images. Apply security patches and install required dependencies.
# Launch instances or provision managed services
# Configure with latest LTS operating system
# Apply security hardening:
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt install -y fail2ban unattended-upgrades
# Configure firewall rules
# Install application dependenciesStep 5: Application/Service Configuration
Configure the primary service with production-ready settings. This includes performance tuning, connection limits, timeout values, and integration with dependent services.
Create dedicated service accounts, configure connection strings, set up environment variables, and verify service starts correctly and passes health checks.
Step 6: Load Balancing and High Availability
Deploy load balancer to distribute traffic and provide failover capability. Configure health checks, SSL termination, and session persistence as required by the application architecture.
Step 7: Data Layer Configuration
Set up data storage and database services with appropriate redundancy, backup schedules, and access controls. Configure connection pooling for application servers and set up read replicas if required for read-heavy workloads.
Step 8: Monitoring and Observability
Deploy monitoring agents, configure metric collection, create dashboards for key indicators, and set up alerting for critical thresholds.
# Key metrics to monitor:
# - CPU utilization (alert > 80%)
# - Memory usage (alert > 85%)
# - Disk I/O and space (alert > 90%)
# - Network throughput and errors
# - Application response time (alert > 2s)
# - Error rate (alert > 5%)
# Configure notification channels (email, Slack, PagerDuty)Step 9: Backup and Recovery
Configure automated backups with appropriate retention. Document and test recovery procedures. For production systems, implement cross-region/cross-AZ replication.
- Daily automated backups with 30-day retention
- Weekly full backup with 90-day retention
- Test restore procedure monthly
- Document RTO/RPO targets and validate them
Step 10: Verification and Go-Live Checklist
# Final verification:
# ✅ Service accessible and responding correctly
# ✅ SSL/TLS configured and certificate valid
# ✅ Health checks passing on all instances
# ✅ Security rules tested (unauthorized access blocked)
# ✅ Monitoring dashboards showing real-time data
# ✅ Alerts configured and test notification received
# ✅ Backup completed successfully
# ✅ Documentation updated with all endpoints and credentialsTroubleshooting
If you encounter issues during setup, check the following common problems:
- Permissions: Ensure your user/role has the required IAM policies attached
- Networking: Verify security lists/groups allow required ports and CIDR ranges
- DNS: Allow 5-10 minutes for DNS propagation after changes
- Logs: Always check service logs first — most errors are clearly logged
- Quotas: Verify your account has sufficient service limits for the resources being created
Conclusion
You now have a fully configured wordpress on aws with ec2, rds, s3, cloudfront, and route 53 ssl setup. This follows production best practices for security, performance, and reliability. Regularly review configurations as requirements evolve and apply security patches promptly.
For production use, consider implementing Infrastructure as Code (Terraform/CloudFormation) to version-control this setup and enable reproducible deployments.