Ghost VPS

Who it suits

Writers and small publications who want a fast blog with built-in newsletters and paid memberships, on their own server. Ghost(Pro) is the managed alternative and funds the project. If you want plugins and themes by the thousand, WordPress has the bigger ecosystem.

Which plan

Budget (1 vCPU, 2 GB) runs a personal blog: Ghost's Docker guide uses a 1 CPU, 2 GB server as its example. Choose Standard for a busy site, or if you turn on Ghost's optional ActivityPub and analytics services, which add containers.

What we install

We clone Ghost's ghost-docker repository to /opt/ghost, generate its database passwords and pull its images. Ghost needs a domain and working email before it can run, so it starts when you run vps9-https with your domain and email: its Caddy gets the certificate, and the owner account is created with a generated password in /root/ghost-admin.txt.

From order to ready

1. Server ready. We email you when the server is running, and you can log in with SSH. The installer starts on that same first boot.
2. Installer running. It logs to /var/log/vps9-setup.log; tail -f it to watch.
3. Application ready. /var/lib/vps9-setup.exit appears when the installer has finished, holding 0 if it worked. The install is done when /opt/ghost holds Ghost's compose.yml and .env and the images are pulled. Ghost is ready after vps9-https, when https://<your domain>/ghost/ shows the login page.

What you still do

1. Put your mail service's SMTP details in /opt/ghost/.env (the mail__ lines). Ghost needs email to log you in, so it won't start without it.
2. Point your domain at the server and allow ports 80 and 443 in the panel firewall.
3. Run vps9-https blog.example.com you@example.com with your domain and email. Ghost starts and your owner login is written to /root/ghost-admin.txt.
4. Log in at https://blog.example.com/ghost/ and change the site title and your name in Settings.

Exposure and security

Nothing runs until you start it. Then Caddy listens on 80 and 443, and Ghost and MySQL stay on Docker's internal network. Ghost's setup page would make its first visitor the owner; here vps9-https creates the owner through Ghost's setup API from inside the server before the site is reachable. Staff accounts are invite-only after that.

Backups and upgrades

Ghost labels its Docker setup a preview. Its update steps are cd /opt/ghost && git pull && docker compose pull && docker compose up -d; read the release notes first. We turn on the operating system's automatic security updates. Back up /opt/ghost/data (Ghost's content and the MySQL data) and /opt/ghost/.env off the server: stop the stack for a consistent copy, and keep Ghost's own export (Settings, Import/Export) as well. We run the hardware, the network and the first-boot install; after that, Ghost is yours to run, and we don't manage, update or back it up for you.

Order it from your terminal

$ vps9 servers create --plan budget --image ubuntu-24.04 --app ghost --hostname web-1 --key key_8f2c

{
  "plan": "budget",
  "image": "ubuntu-24.04",
  "hostname": "web-1",
  "app": "ghost"
}