How to Install n8n on an AWS EC2 Server – Step-by-Step Guide

n8n is a powerful open-source workflow automation tool that lets you connect apps, automate tasks, and build AI-powered pipelines — all self-hosted on your own server. In this guide, we walk you through setting up n8n on an AWS EC2 Ubuntu instance with a custom subdomain, HTTPS, and PM2 for auto-restart.

Prerequisites

• Amazon EC2 instance running Ubuntu (Amazon Linux 2 or similar)
• SSH access to your instance
• Security Group with port 5678 open for n8n
• A domain or subdomain (e.g., n8n.example.com) with an A record pointing to your EC2 public IP
• nginx installed on the server

Step 1 – Update & Install Essentials

sudo apt update -y
sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt install curl nginx unzip -y

Step 2 – Install Node.js (v18)

curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_18.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install -y nodejs
node -v
npm -v

Step 3 – Install PM2 Globally

sudo npm install pm2 -g

Step 4 – Install n8n

sudo npm install -g n8n

Step 5 – Start n8n with PM2

Use PM2 to start n8n so it runs in the background and restarts automatically on reboot.

pm2 start n8n
pm2 startup
pm2 save

Step 6 – Configure Nginx Reverse Proxy

Create an Nginx server block to proxy requests from your subdomain to n8n running on localhost:5678.

sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/n8n

Paste the following configuration (replace n8n.example.com with your actual subdomain):

server {
    server_name n8n.example.com;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://localhost:5678/;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
        proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    }
}
server {
    if ($host = n8n.example.com) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    }
    listen 80;
    server_name n8n.example.com;
    return 404;
}

Enable the configuration and restart Nginx:

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/n8n /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
sudo nginx -t
sudo systemctl restart nginx

Step 7 – Enable HTTPS with Let's Encrypt (Optional)

sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-nginx -y
sudo certbot --nginx -d n8n.example.com

When prompted, choose redirect to automatically enforce HTTPS. Certbot will update your Nginx config and renew the certificate automatically.

Step 8 – Verify Everything is Running

pm2 list
sudo systemctl status nginx
curl -I http://localhost:5678

Visit https://n8n.example.com in your browser — you should see the n8n login screen.

Useful PM2 Commands

• pm2 logs n8n — View live n8n logs
• pm2 restart n8n — Restart the n8n process
• pm2 stop n8n — Stop n8n without removing it from PM2
• pm2 list — Check status of all PM2-managed processes