How to Download Your Intermediate SSL Certificate

Certificate Authorities, or the entities that issue SSL certificates, assert their authority over the certificates they issue by linking back to a root certificate. Every SSL certificate links back to a root certificate, and your browser uses the root certificate to make sure your certificate is authentic.

Often, certificate authorities will use intermediate certificates to link your SSL certificate back to their root certificate. Using intermediate certificate simplifies the administration of many certificates at once and adds another layer of protection for the root certificate. The certificates you receive from Gandi use an intermediate certificate.

You will want to download and install the intermediate certificate on your servers to ensure that your visitors can validate the trust chain all the way back to the root certificate.

If your visitors use an older browser (pre-2010), they may not recognize the site as secure unless you have the intermediate certificate loaded.

To download your intermediate certificate for installation on your server, follow these steps:

  1. After logging in, click “SSL Certificates” in the left navigation menu.

  2. Click on the name of the certificate you want to download.

  3. Click on the link to download the intermediate certificate.

You can then download this intermediate certificate on your server. If you use Gandi Web Hosting and choose to have your certificate automatically installed, then your intermediate certificate will also be installed as part of this process.

Note

You cannot download automatically-generated certificates. If you want to download a certificate, you must regenerate the certificate with a CSR.