Step 2 - Certificate Signing Request (CSR)

This screen is where you provide the CSR - a technical file from your web server that the Certificate Authority uses to create your certificate.

What Is a CSR?

A CSR (Certificate Signing Request) is a block of text generated by your web server. It contains your domain name (called the Common Name) and a public key. The CA reads this information to create your certificate. Your IT team, hosting provider, or server administrator can generate a CSR for you.

📌 NOTE

The public key and signature algorithm from your CSR are used for certificate generation. Subject details such as Organization, Country, and State are pre-filled from your CSR for convenience but can be edited on screen. The values you submit in the form will be the final values in the issued certificate - not necessarily what was in the CSR.

Variant Differences - CSR Requirements

Variant	CSR Common Name (CN) Format & Key Size
DV SSL Certificate	CN = yourdomain.com (e.g., www.mybusiness.com). Key size: 2048-bit RSA minimum.
DV Wildcard SSL Certificate	CN = *.yourdomain.com - the asterisk and dot are REQUIRED (e.g., *.mybusiness.com). Key size: 4096-bit RSA recommended for stronger security.
DV UCC SSL Certificate	CN = your primary domain (e.g., mybusiness.com). Additional domains are added as Subject Alternative Names (SANs). Key size: 2048-bit RSA minimum.
DV Wildcard UCC SSL Certificate	CN = your primary wildcard domain (e.g., *.mybusiness.com). Additional wildcard domains are SANs. Key size: 4096-bit RSA recommended.

⚠️ IMPORTANT

Wildcard certificates MUST have the asterisk in the Common Name: *.yourdomain.com - NOT yourdomain.com. A CSR generated without the asterisk will NOT work for a Wildcard certificate and the order will be rejected by the CA.

If your CSR was generated for the wrong domain, ask your IT team to generate a new CSR with the correct Common Name before proceeding.

Your Three Options on This Screen

Option A - Upload CSR File

1. Click the Choose File button next to 'Upload CSR'.

2. A file browser opens. Navigate to your .csr or .pem file on your computer.

3. Select the file. The filename appears next to the button once selected.

Option B - Paste CSR Text

4. Open your CSR file in any text editor (Notepad on Windows, TextEdit on Mac).

5. Copy the entire block - starting with -----BEGIN CERTIFICATE REQUEST----- and ending with -----END CERTIFICATE REQUEST-----, including those header and footer lines.

6. Paste the copied text into the 'Paste CSR' text box on screen.

Option C - Skip CSR

7. Tick the 'Skip CSR' checkbox at the top of the screen.

8. You can complete the order and pay now, then provide the CSR later.

9. Use this if your IT team has not generated the CSR yet but you need to start the order.

💡 TIP

If you use a shared hosting service such as cPanel or Plesk: Log in to your hosting control panel, go to SSL/TLS settings, and generate a CSR from there. For standard DV SSL, enter your domain as the Common Name. For Wildcard variants, enter *.yourdomain.com with the asterisk. Copy the CSR text from your hosting panel and paste it into the Paste CSR box on this screen.

Click Back to go back, or Next to proceed.