Uploaded October 2024 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
In this video, I will guide you through the complete process of setting up your very own OpenVPN Virtual Private Network (VPN) server on a Linux Virtual Private Server (VPS) also known as a cloud server. OpenVPN is an open source VPN daemon, that's cross-platform. It utilises Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption for its tunnelling protocol and keeps your data private when browsing the internet using AES-256 encryption. DigitalOcean will be the server host provider used in this video demonstration. It offers cloud servers through a service called Droplets. To install OpenVPN on our VPS we will use a bash shell installation script hosted on GitHub by Nyr called openvpn-install.
I may earn a commission if you use the link below to sign up, at no extra cost to you.
🔵Free $200 DigitalOcean cloud credits using my affiliate link: websplaining.com/digitalocean
How To Get $200 In Free DigitalOcean Cloud Credits youtu.be/9QE7zbyc6Ek
How To Install PuTTY on Windows youtu.be/0ptZPTTwRaE
OpenVPN Connect Client Installation openvpn.net/client
Download PuTTY putty.org
openvpn-install script by Nyr github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install
What Is My IP Address whatismyipaddress.com
Steps To Setup OpenVPN On An Ubuntu Linux VPS:
1. Navigate to websplaining.com/digitalocean and create a free DigitalOcean account. My affiliate link grants you $200 in free cloud credit for 60 days as a new user
2. Once you have created your DO account, you will be taken to your DigitalOcean dashboard. Click Create.
3. Click Droplets
4. Configure your droplet and then click Create Droplet
5. While your droplet is being created, navigate to openvpn.net/client and install your desired OpenVPN Connect client for your Operating System (OS).
6. On your DigitalOcean dashboard, copy your droplets IP address.
7. If you're on Windows as demonstrated in this video, navigate to putty.org and download the SSH client called PuTTY. If you're on an OS that is unsupported by PuTTY you will need to use an alternative SSH client. For a detailed installation guide of PuTTY check out this video of mine youtu.be/0ptZPTTwRaE
8. Once PuTTY has been installed, open up the PuTTY SSH client and paste in your droplets IP address into the Host Name (or IP address) section
9. Click Open
10. In the PuTTY command line terminal, login as root by typing the word root and hitting Enter on your keyboard
11. Next, type in your root password that you created for your droplet and hit Enter on your keyboard. You will now be logged into your droplet
12. Open another browser tab and navigate to github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install
13. Highlight and copy the script command which you can also find below:
wget git.io/vpn -O openvpn-install.sh && bash openvpn-install.sh
14. Right click to paste in the above OpenVPN script command into your terminal
15. Press Enter on your keyboard to execute the command
16. Follow the OpenVPN script installers prompts to configure and install OpenVPN on your cloud server. To roll with the defaults, press Enter on your keyboard for each prompt
17. If you're greeted with a purple screen that asks you "Which services should be restarted" then simply press tab on your keyboard followed by Enter.
18. OpenVPN will now finish installing on your server. To get your client configuration information to connect to your VPN server, you're going to need to type the following commands:
ls
cat [YourClientName].ovpn
19. Highlight to copy the config info displayed from the word "client" to "/tls-crypt" and everything in between by simply highlighting it in the command line terminal window
20. Open a text editor and paste in your config info into it.
21. Click Save followed by Save as
22. Name your file the same as your OpenVPN config name, followed by the file extension .ovpn
23. Click Save
24. Open up your OpenVPN Connect client, left click on upload file and drag and drop your .ovpn to import your OVPN profile
25. Give your profile a name and click Connect to be automatically connected to your OpenVPN server. This is indicated by the green toggle. You can disconnect from your OpenVPN server at any time by left clicking on the toggle
26. Check if your current IP address displayed on whatismyipaddress.com matches your droplets IP address. If it matches, then OpenVPN is working!
[Note] Rerun openvpn-install script to create new clients
openvpn-install script defaults:
- IP: VPS IPv4 address
-Protocol: UDP
- Port: 1194
- Client name: client
- DNS Server: Current system resolvers
⌚:
0:00 - Intro
1:23 - Create The OpenVPN Server
4:28 - Install OpenVPN Connect Client
6:46 - Login To OpenVPN Server Using SSH Client
8:51 - Install OpenVPN & Add New Client Config(s) On Server
13:38 - Save Client Config Info As .OVPN Profiles
14:33 - Connect To OpenVPN Using .OVPN Profile
15:30 - Check If OpenVPN Is Active
16:15 - Outro
#OpenVPN #VPN #DigitalOcean
In this video, I will guide you through the complete process of setting up your very own OpenVPN Virtual Private Network (VPN) server on a Linux Virtual Private Server (VPS) also known as a cloud server. OpenVPN is an open source VPN daemon, that's cross-platform. It utilises Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption for its tunnelling protocol and keeps your data private when browsing the internet using AES-256 encryption. DigitalOcean will be the server host provider used in this video demonstration. It offers cloud servers through a service called Droplets. To install OpenVPN on our VPS we will use a bash shell installation script hosted on GitHub by Nyr called openvpn-install.
I may earn a commission if you use the link below to sign up, at no extra cost to you.
🔵Free $200 DigitalOcean cloud credits using my affiliate link: websplaining.com/digitalocean
How To Get $200 In Free DigitalOcean Cloud Credits youtu.be/9QE7zbyc6Ek
How To Install PuTTY on Windows youtu.be/0ptZPTTwRaE
OpenVPN Connect Client Installation openvpn.net/client
Download PuTTY putty.org
openvpn-install script by Nyr github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install
What Is My IP Address whatismyipaddress.com
Steps To Setup OpenVPN On An Ubuntu Linux VPS:
1. Navigate to websplaining.com/digitalocean and create a free DigitalOcean account. My affiliate link grants you $200 in free cloud credit for 60 days as a new user
2. Once you have created your DO account, you will be taken to your DigitalOcean dashboard. Click Create.
3. Click Droplets
4. Configure your droplet and then click Create Droplet
5. While your droplet is being created, navigate to openvpn.net/client and install your desired OpenVPN Connect client for your Operating System (OS).
6. On your DigitalOcean dashboard, copy your droplets IP address.
7. If you're on Windows as demonstrated in this video, navigate to putty.org and download the SSH client called PuTTY. If you're on an OS that is unsupported by PuTTY you will need to use an alternative SSH client. For a detailed installation guide of PuTTY check out this video of mine youtu.be/0ptZPTTwRaE
8. Once PuTTY has been installed, open up the PuTTY SSH client and paste in your droplets IP address into the Host Name (or IP address) section
9. Click Open
10. In the PuTTY command line terminal, login as root by typing the word root and hitting Enter on your keyboard
11. Next, type in your root password that you created for your droplet and hit Enter on your keyboard. You will now be logged into your droplet
12. Open another browser tab and navigate to github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install
13. Highlight and copy the script command which you can also find below:
wget git.io/vpn -O openvpn-install.sh && bash openvpn-install.sh
14. Right click to paste in the above OpenVPN script command into your terminal
15. Press Enter on your keyboard to execute the command
16. Follow the OpenVPN script installers prompts to configure and install OpenVPN on your cloud server. To roll with the defaults, press Enter on your keyboard for each prompt
17. If you're greeted with a purple screen that asks you "Which services should be restarted" then simply press tab on your keyboard followed by Enter.
18. OpenVPN will now finish installing on your server. To get your client configuration information to connect to your VPN server, you're going to need to type the following commands:
ls
cat [YourClientName].ovpn
19. Highlight to copy the config info displayed from the word "client" to "/tls-crypt" and everything in between by simply highlighting it in the command line terminal window
20. Open a text editor and paste in your config info into it.
21. Click Save followed by Save as
22. Name your file the same as your OpenVPN config name, followed by the file extension .ovpn
23. Click Save
24. Open up your OpenVPN Connect client, left click on upload file and drag and drop your .ovpn to import your OVPN profile
25. Give your profile a name and click Connect to be automatically connected to your OpenVPN server. This is indicated by the green toggle. You can disconnect from your OpenVPN server at any time by left clicking on the toggle
26. Check if your current IP address displayed on whatismyipaddress.com matches your droplets IP address. If it matches, then OpenVPN is working!
[Note] Rerun openvpn-install script to create new clients
openvpn-install script defaults:
- IP: VPS IPv4 address
-Protocol: UDP
- Port: 1194
- Client name: client
- DNS Server: Current system resolvers
⌚:
0:00 - Intro
1:23 - Create The OpenVPN Server
4:28 - Install OpenVPN Connect Client
6:46 - Login To OpenVPN Server Using SSH Client
8:51 - Install OpenVPN & Add New Client Config(s) On Server
13:38 - Save Client Config Info As .OVPN Profiles
14:33 - Connect To OpenVPN Using .OVPN Profile
15:30 - Check If OpenVPN Is Active
16:15 - Outro
#OpenVPN #VPN #DigitalOcean
