Who it is for
You rent a VPS from Hetzner, DigitalOcean, Vultr, Hostinger, AWS, Google Cloud, Azure or anyone else who will give you a Debian or Ubuntu image and a public IPv4 address. You want to run real applications on it — WordPress for a client, a Laravel or Node.js product, a Python service, a container stack — without spending the evening on nginx configuration, PHP-FPM pools, certificates and backup scripts, and without handing the machine to a hosting company.
auraPanel is a control panel you install on that server. It is not a hosting service and it does not run on our infrastructure: the panel, your sites and your data stay on the VPS you pay for.
From fresh VPS to running application
This is the whole path, as the documentation describes it. On a small VPS the panel is answering within a couple of minutes of running the installer.
- Create the VPS. Debian 12 or 13, or Ubuntu 22.04, 24.04 or 26.04 LTS; 2 GB of RAM is comfortable (the panel is designed for 1 GB); allow ports 22, 80, 443 and 8443 in the provider firewall.
- Run the installer over SSH:
curl -fsSL https://aurapanel.net/installer.sh | bash. It verifies the release signature, installs nginx, the runtimes and engines you tick, enables UFW and fail2ban, and prints the panel address. Install guide → - Create the administrator in the browser, set the server time zone, and register a passkey or TOTP.
- Point a domain at the server, and give the panel itself a domain so it gets a Let's Encrypt certificate.
- Add a site. Pick WordPress or another one-click application, or PHP, Node.js, Python, static, reverse proxy or Docker Compose. The panel creates a Linux user, the directory, the nginx server block and the runtime, and requests HTTPS in the background. Sites →
- Deploy your code over SFTP, git or the File Browser, or let the one-click installer do it. Add a PostgreSQL or MariaDB database from the site and open it in auraDB.
- Schedule backups — databases and files, hourly to weekly, with retention — and optionally copy them off the VPS to S3, B2, Google Drive, Dropbox, SFTP or Swift.
Applications and domains
Each site is its own Linux user with its own directory, server block and, where the type needs one, its own runtime process. One-click installers set up WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, Moodle, Laravel, Symfony, TYPO3, Matomo, Nextcloud, Gitea and others with their database, administrator and configuration; assisted installers prepare the site and hand you the application's own setup. Redirects map old hostnames or paths onto sites, each with its own certificate.
- One Linux user per site
- One-click and assisted installers
- Redirects with HTTPS
- Basic auth per site
- Document root override
Runtimes
PHP 8.1 to 8.5 install side by side; every PHP site has its own PHP-FPM pool on the version it chooses and switches versions without touching the others. Node.js versions come from nodejs.org and are pinned per site; the panel works out the start command from package.json, injects PORT and runs the app as a systemd service with restart back-off. Python sites run your WSGI application under gunicorn the same way. Docker Compose sites put a container stack behind the same nginx and HTTPS.
- PHP 8.1–8.5 per site
- Node.js 18–24 per site
- Python via gunicorn
- Docker Compose stacks
- Redis object cache
Databases
Create PostgreSQL or MariaDB databases per site, bound to that site and reachable only from the server. auraDB, built into the panel, is where you browse schemas, run SQL with EXPLAIN, edit rows and manage privileges — every statement checked against your role and recorded in a hash-chained audit file. Import and export dumps from the command line with apcli db. Databases →
HTTPS and Cloudflare
Certificates are issued by a built-in ACME client as soon as DNS points at the VPS and renewed every 12 hours if they are within 30 days of expiry. Wildcards and Cloudflare-proxied domains use DNS-01 through a Cloudflare API token stored encrypted on the server. For a Cloudflare-proxied site, the edge shield locks the origin so only Cloudflare's address ranges can reach it. HTTPS →
Backups and snapshots
Site backups capture databases and files together on a schedule you set, kept for a number of days with a minimum count, and copied off the server through rclone. Restore over the same site or into a new one; WordPress, WooCommerce and Moodle restores re-home their database credentials so a copy never points at the original. Whole-server snapshots run on a schedule for Hetzner, DigitalOcean, Vultr and Hostinger with in-panel restore, and for AWS, Google Cloud and Azure with restore in the provider console. Backups →
Logs and server resources
Every site has its own access and error logs, rotated daily, readable in the panel with filters, day stepping and live tail. Node.js, Python and Docker services log to the journal under a predictable unit name. The Resources screen keeps six months of one-minute CPU, memory, disk and network samples, attributes usage to sites, and a watchdog throttles crash-looping services before they take the VPS down. Logs and monitoring →
Security and ownership
Passkeys or TOTP for panel sign-in, roles that limit users to the sites they are granted, an audit log of every action, encrypted secrets, security headers on every site, and Ed25519-signed updates that roll back automatically if the new version does not come up. The installer enables UFW and fail2ban; firewall rules beyond that, SSH hardening and operating-system updates stay yours, as does the server itself. Standard paths, distribution packages from vendor repositories, plain nginx and systemd: nothing that stops you from running the server without the panel one day. Security →
Frequently asked
Which VPS providers work?
Any that offers a Debian 12/13 or Ubuntu 22.04–26.04 image with a public IPv4 address, on x86-64 or ARM64. The panel also reads the metadata services of AWS, Google Cloud, Hetzner and DigitalOcean to show the public IP, and takes snapshots on seven providers.
How big a VPS do I need?
The panel is designed for 1 vCPU, 1 GB of RAM and 10 GB of disk; 2 GB is comfortable once MariaDB and PHP are running. With 2 GB or less the installer adds a swap file.
Can I manage several VPSes from one panel?
No. auraPanel runs one panel per server; each server has its own licence, and the customer portal lists them. A multi-server dashboard is not a feature today.
Do I need to know Linux?
You need to be able to SSH in and paste one command. After that the panel does the day-to-day work, and apcli is there when you want a shell. The Linux server page explains what is automated and what stays with you.
What does it cost?
One licence per server, unlimited sites, every feature included; 30 days free with no card. Pricing →