Is My-SSL Free actually free?

Yes. It issues Let's Encrypt domain-validated certificates at no cost, with no credit card required. Let's Encrypt is a non-profit certificate authority whose certificates are free by design; My-SSL Free adds the dashboard, auto-renewal, alerts, and API around them.

Is a free SSL certificate less secure than a paid one?

Not at the encryption level. A free DV certificate secures the connection exactly as strongly as a paid DV certificate. The difference is identity validation (OV/EV verify your organization; DV verifies only domain control) and things like warranty and support — not the strength of the encryption.

Can I get a wildcard certificate for free?

Yes, for *.example.com. Wildcards from Let's Encrypt must be validated using the DNS-01 challenge, meaning you add a DNS TXT record rather than uploading an HTTP file. The dashboard walks you through it.

How long do the certificates last, and do I have to renew manually?

Let's Encrypt certificates are valid for 90 days today and will move toward 45 days by 2028. My-SSL Free auto-renews them ahead of expiry and emails you alerts, so you don't renew by hand.

Can the free certificate show my company name like EV?

No. Domain-validated certificates never display an organization name — only OV and EV certificates do, and those require human verification of your business and are not free. If you need a displayed identity, look at the paid OV or EV options.

Can I automate issuance instead of using the dashboard?

Yes. My-SSL Free exposes a REST API so you can request and renew certificates from a deployment pipeline rather than clicking through the UI.

Free SSL Certificates by My-SSL Free (Let's Encrypt)

We've launched My-SSL Free — a free service that issues domain-validated SSL/TLS certificates powered by Let's Encrypt, with a browser dashboard, auto-renewal, expiry alerts, and a REST API. No credit card, no account fees. If you run a personal site, a side project, a blog, or a handful of subdomains and you just need HTTPS working, this is for you.

This page explains what the free service actually does, where it fits, and — just as important — where it doesn't, so you can pick the right tool the first time.

What My-SSL Free gives you

A free, automatically renewable DV certificate for your domain, issued through Let's Encrypt, that you can download and install on any server. Concretely:

Single-domain, wildcard, and multi-domain (SAN) certificates. Secure example.com plus www, cover every subdomain with *.example.com, or put several names on one certificate.
Two validation methods. Prove you control the domain by uploading an HTTP verification file to your server, or by adding a DNS TXT record. The system checks automatically.
Auto-renewal. Certificates renew before they lapse, so a 90-day Let's Encrypt cert doesn't quietly expire on you. (More on the 90-day figure below — it's about to change.)
Expiry alerts. Email reminders ahead of expiry, as a backstop to auto-renewal.
4096-bit RSA keys, with private keys encrypted at rest.
A REST API for wiring issuance into a deployment pipeline instead of clicking through a UI.

You get three files to install: the certificate, the private key, and the CA bundle (the intermediate chain). They drop into Apache, Nginx, cPanel, Plesk, or anything else that takes a standard PEM certificate.

Why we built it

Most websites need exactly one thing from SSL: a browser padlock and an encrypted connection, with no warnings. For that job, a domain-validated certificate is enough, and there's no good reason to charge for it — Let's Encrypt issues DV certificates free precisely to make HTTPS the default across the web.

What people do still struggle with is the operational side: running an ACME client, remembering renewals, handling the DNS-01 challenge for wildcards, getting alerted when something breaks. My-SSL Free wraps that in a dashboard and an API so you don't have to babysit it. Free issuance, managed renewal, one place to see what's expiring.

It also gives us an honest free tier. If your needs grow into organization or extended validation — for example, you want your company's verified legal name in the certificate — you can move up to a paid product on the main site without changing vendors. The free service isn't a teaser; it's the bottom of a ladder you may never need to climb.

What free DV certificates do not do

This is the part most "free SSL" pages skip, and it's the part that saves you a support ticket later.

A free certificate from Let's Encrypt is domain-validated only. Validation confirms that you control the domain — nothing more. It does not verify your organization's identity, so it can't display a company name, and Let's Encrypt has said plainly it has no plans to offer OV or EV certificates. If you need a certificate that asserts a vetted legal identity, that's an OV or EV product, and it isn't free anywhere — the cost pays for humans verifying your business.

A few other honest limits:

Encryption strength is identical to paid DV. A free DV certificate encrypts exactly as well as a paid one; the difference is identity assurance and support, not crypto. Anyone telling you free SSL is "less secure" at the connection level is wrong.
No warranty or support SLA. Paid certificates typically carry a relying-party warranty and vendor support. Free DV doesn't.
Wildcards require DNS validation. Because of how Let's Encrypt issues them, a *.example.com wildcard must be validated with the DNS-01 challenge (a TXT record), not the HTTP file method. The dashboard guides you through this, but you'll need access to your DNS.

So: free DV is the right answer for blogs, portfolios, internal tools, dev and staging environments, and most small-to-medium sites. It's the wrong answer if you specifically need a displayed organization identity or a warranty. For a full side-by-side of where free and paid certificates genuinely differ — lifetimes, wildcards, rate limits, support — see our Let's Encrypt vs paid SSL comparison.

About that 90-day lifetime

Let's Encrypt certificates are valid for 90 days today, which is exactly why auto-renewal matters — manual 90-day renewals are a chore people forget. That window is shrinking. Let's Encrypt has announced it will cut certificate lifetimes from 90 days toward 45 days, phased in through February 2028, with an opt-in 45-day profile arriving in 2026. This tracks the broader CA/Browser Forum move to shorter certificates across the whole industry.

The takeaway for you is simple: shorter lifetimes make manual renewal impractical and automation non-negotiable. A managed service that renews for you — or a properly configured ACME client — is how you stay ahead of it. If you'd rather understand the automation yourself, our guide to how ACME and Certbot automate renewals walks through it, and the 47-day certificate lifetime changes explain where the deadlines come from.

How to get one

Three steps, no payment:

Enter your domain at My-SSL Free — a single name, a wildcard (*.example.com), or several names. Choose HTTP or DNS validation.
Verify ownership by uploading the verification file to your server or adding the DNS TXT record. The system confirms it automatically.
Download and install the certificate, private key, and CA bundle on your server.

If you later decide you need organization or extended validation, a wildcard with a warranty, or paid support, compare the paid SSL certificate options — same provider, no migration headache.

FAQ

Sources worth checking directly

Let's Encrypt — official FAQ (DV-only policy, no OV/EV plans, wildcard via DNS-01, SAN support)
Let's Encrypt — Decreasing Certificate Lifetimes to 45 Days (the 90→45 day roadmap)
CA/Browser Forum — Baseline Requirements (the industry-wide shift to shorter certificate lifetimes)