Hosting a website on your Windows VPS (IIS)

What this is#

The Windows path from fresh server to live site, with IIS, Windows' built-in web server. One honest note first: if your stack is PHP/WordPress/LAMP-shaped, a Linux VPS is the more natural (and cheaper) home. IIS is the right tool when the stack is .NET / ASP.NET, or Windows-only software, where it's excellent.

1. Install IIS#

Server Manager → Add Roles and Features → Web Server (IIS), or the one-liner:

Install-WindowsFeature Web-Server -IncludeManagementTools

Browse to http://localhost on the VPS, the default IIS page confirms it's alive. For ASP.NET apps, also install the .NET Hosting Bundle matching your app's version (grabbing installers without a browser).

2. Create the site#

In IIS Manager (inetmgr): right-click Sites → Add Website, name it, point the physical path at your site's folder (conventionally C:\inetpub\yoursite), and set the binding: type http, port 80, and your domain in Host name (that's what lets several sites share the server). Each site gets its own application pool by default, keep that, it isolates crashes and recycles per site.

3. Open the ports and point the domain#

• Allow web traffic in Windows Firewall, the IIS role usually adds the World Wide Web rules itself; verify 80 and 443 are allowed rather than assuming.
• Point your domain's A record at the VPS IP, same DNS story as everywhere, and give it a few minutes before the SSL step, which validates over that DNS.

4. Free SSL with win-acme#

The IIS equivalent of certbot is win-acme, the standard free Let's Encrypt client for Windows:

1. Download win-acme and run wacs.exe as Administrator.
2. Choose the simple option (N, create certificate with default settings), pick your IIS site from the list.
3. It validates the domain, installs the certificate, creates the https binding on the site for you, and registers a scheduled task that auto-renews, the whole lifecycle in one run.

Verify the padlock in a browser, and that the renewal task exists in Task Scheduler. Certificate errors later have their own guide, the concepts (expiry, names, chains) are identical on IIS.

When something misbehaves#

• IIS request logs live in C:\inetpub\logs\LogFiles, and application errors land in Event Viewer (Windows Logs → Application). Between those two and pasting the exact error into an AI chatbot, most IIS mysteries resolve quickly, HTTP error codes mean the same things here (403s included, though the fix on Windows is NTFS permissions and app-pool identity rather than chown).
• Site slow or the server grinding? The Windows triage.

Still need help?#

You can open a support ticket. So we can help on the first reply, it's worth mentioning:

• the VPS and the site's domain,
• what fails (site not loading, a binding, the certificate) with the exact error,
• anything relevant from the IIS logs or Event Viewer.

Related questions#

• "How do I host a website on my Windows VPS?"
• "How do I install IIS?"
• "How do I get a free SSL certificate for IIS (win-acme)?"
• "Can I host multiple sites on one Windows VPS?"
• "Where are the IIS logs?"