Common Certbot Errors and Solutions

Certbot automates Let's Encrypt certificate management but encounters various errors. Authentication failures occur when HTTP validation cannot reach your server. DNS propagation delays affect DNS validation. Rate limiting prevents excessive certificate requests.

Debug Certbot issues:

# Test HTTP validation accessibility
curl -I http://example.com/.well-known/acme-challenge/test

# Dry run to test without rate limits
certbot renew --dry-run

# Verbose output for debugging
certbot certonly --webroot -w /var/www/html -d example.com -d www.example.com --debug

# Check Certbot logs
tail -f /var/log/letsencrypt/letsencrypt.log

# Force renewal
certbot renew --force-renewal --cert-name example.com