How to create an HTTPS server in Node.js?

Question

Given an SSL key and certificate, how does one create an HTTPS service?

Answer 1

Found this question while googling "node https" but the example in the accepted answer is very old - taken from the docs of the current (v0.10) version of node, it should look like this:

var https = require('https');
var fs = require('fs');

var options = {
  key: fs.readFileSync('test/fixtures/keys/agent2-key.pem'),
  cert: fs.readFileSync('test/fixtures/keys/agent2-cert.pem')
};

https.createServer(options, function (req, res) {
  res.writeHead(200);
  res.end("hello world\n");
}).listen(8000);

Answer 2

The minimal setup for an HTTPS server in Node.js would be something like this :

var https = require('https');
var fs = require('fs');

var httpsOptions = {
    key: fs.readFileSync('path/to/server-key.pem'),
    cert: fs.readFileSync('path/to/server-crt.pem')
};

var app = function (req, res) {
  res.writeHead(200);
  res.end("hello world\n");
}

https.createServer(httpsOptions, app).listen(4433);

If you also want to support http requests, you need to make just this small modification :

var http = require('http');
var https = require('https');
var fs = require('fs');

var httpsOptions = {
    key: fs.readFileSync('path/to/server-key.pem'),
    cert: fs.readFileSync('path/to/server-crt.pem')
};

var app = function (req, res) {
  res.writeHead(200);
  res.end("hello world\n");
}

http.createServer(app).listen(8888);
https.createServer(httpsOptions, app).listen(4433);

Answer 3

I found following example.

https://web.archive.org/web/20120203022122/http://www.silassewell.com/blog/2010/06/03/node-js-https-ssl-server-example/

This works for node v0.1.94 - v0.3.1. server.setSecure() is removed in newer versions of node.

Directly from that source:

const crypto = require('crypto'),
  fs = require("fs"),
  http = require("http");

var privateKey = fs.readFileSync('privatekey.pem').toString();
var certificate = fs.readFileSync('certificate.pem').toString();

var credentials = crypto.createCredentials({key: privateKey, cert: certificate});

var handler = function (req, res) {
  res.writeHead(200, {'Content-Type': 'text/plain'});
  res.end('Hello World\n');
};

var server = http.createServer();
server.setSecure(credentials);
server.addListener("request", handler);
server.listen(8000);

Answer 4

var path = require('path');
var express = require('express');

var app = express();

var staticPath = path.join(__dirname, '/public');
app.use(express.static(staticPath));

app.listen(8070, function() {
  console.log('Server started at port 8070');
});

Answer 5

The above answers are good but with Express and node this will work fine.

Since express create the app for you, I'll skip that here.

var express = require('express')
  , fs = require('fs')
  , routes = require('./routes');

var privateKey = fs.readFileSync('cert/key.pem').toString();
var certificate = fs.readFileSync('cert/certificate.pem').toString();  

// To enable HTTPS
var app = module.exports = express.createServer({key: privateKey, cert: certificate});

Answer 6

Update

Use Let's Encrypt via Greenlock.js

Original Post

I noticed that none of these answers show that adding a Intermediate Root CA to the chain, here are some zero-config examples to play with to see that:

• https://github.com/coolaj86/nodejs-ssl-example
• http://blog.coolaj86.com/articles/how-to-create-a-csr-for-https-tls-ssl-rsa-pems/
• https://github.com/coolaj86/nodejs-self-signed-certificate-example

Snippet:

var options = {
  key: fs.readFileSync(path.join('certs', 'my-server.key.pem'))
, ca: [ fs.readFileSync(path.join('certs', 'my-root-ca.crt.pem'))]
, cert: fs.readFileSync(path.join('certs', 'my-server.crt.pem'))
, requestCert: false
, rejectUnauthorized: false
};

var server = https.createServer(options);
var app = require('./my-express-or-connect-app').create(server);
server.on('request', app);
server.listen(443, function () {
  console.log("Listening on " + server.address().address + ":" + server.address().port);
});

var insecureServer = http.createServer();
server.listen(80, function () {
  console.log("Listening on " + server.address().address + ":" + server.address().port);
});

This is one of those things that's often easier if you don't try to do it directly through connect or express, but let the native https module handle it and then use that to serve you connect / express app.

Also, if you use server.on('request', app) instead of passing the app when creating the server, it gives you the opportunity to pass the server instance to some initializer function that creates the connect / express app (if you want to do websockets over ssl on the same server, for example).