Step 1 – Sign In to Matomo

Matomo is fully installed and ready – there is no setup wizard to complete. Your server’s IP address is shown in the Server Information section on the Overview tab of your server in the client portal. The application settings you entered when ordering, passwords included, are shown in the Matomo Credentials card on the same tab. Matomo is accessible by IP address, open your browser and go to:

https://your.server.ip

HTTPS without a domain. Since January 2026 Let’s Encrypt issues certificates for IP addresses (official announcement), so your server gets a real, browser-trusted certificate on first boot – before you connect any domain. Certificates of this kind are short-lived (about six days) and renew automatically. If your server is not reachable from the internet on port 80 (for example, it sits behind a router), the certificate cannot be issued – in that case use http:// instead.

Sign in with:

After signing in you will see the Matomo dashboard.

Matomo is installed automatically within about a minute after the server starts. Until it is ready, the address answers 403 Forbidden – this protects the installer from outsiders. If the page still shows 403 after several minutes, the automatic installation did not complete: reinstall the server with the Rebuild button on its Overview tab in the client portal.

“Urgent PHP security update required” banner. Matomo decides this by the PHP version number (8.3.6). Ubuntu ships security fixes without changing that number, and this server already includes the fix for the October 2026 PHP vulnerabilities. You can check it over SSH: dpkg -l php8.3-common shows version 8.3.6-0ubuntu0.24.04.13 or newer. Close the banner with the × button.

If the server’s IP address changes, Matomo adds the new address to its trusted hosts automatically at the next start of the server.

If you placed the server behind a VyOS router on a private network, the server has only a private address, so it does not get the IP certificate, and Matomo is set up for that private address. You can open Matomo over http:// on the private address through a VPN on the router (WireGuard or OpenVPN, on the router’s Configuration tab). To make Matomo reachable from the internet, forward ports 80 and 443 to the server on the router’s Configuration tab (Port forwarding), point your domain to the router’s public address and connect the domain (Step 4): until then, Matomo’s links point to the private address. Matomo must be reachable from the internet to receive tracking data from your websites. Forward port 22 as well if you need SSH from the internet.

Firewall. If you turn on the Firewall for this server in the client portal, allow incoming TCP port 80 in its rules, along with 443 (HTTPS). Certificates renew over port 80 – the IP certificate every few days – and without that rule the certificate expires and the browser starts showing a warning.

Step 2 – Set Your Email Address

The administrator account uses the email you entered when ordering the server. Password recovery and scheduled reports go to this address. To change it:

Go to Administration (gear icon) → Personal → Settings, enter your email and click Save. Matomo will ask for your password to confirm the change.

The username admin cannot be changed – this is a Matomo restriction. You can create additional users under Administration → System → Users.

Step 3 – Add Your Website and Install Tracking

A placeholder website called My Website was created during installation. Replace it with your own site:

Go to Administration → Websites → Manage. Edit the existing entry or add a new one – enter the site name and URL, then save.

Then open Administration → Websites → Tracking Code, copy the JavaScript snippet and paste it before the closing </head> tag on every page you want to track.

Visits start appearing in your reports within a few minutes.

Step 4 – Configure Domain and SSL (Optional)

To use Matomo with your own domain and HTTPS:

1. Create an A record in your DNS settings pointing your domain to the server IP
2. Wait for DNS propagation (usually a few minutes to a few hours)
3. Connect via SSH and run Certbot to obtain a free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate:

certbot --apache -d your-domain.com

Certbot will automatically configure Apache for HTTPS and set up certificate auto-renewal.

After obtaining the certificate, add your domain to the Matomo trusted hosts list: go to Administration → System → General Settings → Trusted Matomo hostname.

Fail2Ban – Brute-Force Protection

Your server comes with Fail2Ban pre-configured to protect SSH from brute-force attacks.

Useful commands:

# Check banned IPs
fail2ban-client status sshd

# Unban an IP
fail2ban-client set sshd unbanip 1.2.3.4

If you accidentally lock yourself out, open the Console on your server’s Overview tab in the client portal and unban your IP.

Service Management

# Check service status
systemctl status apache2
systemctl status mysql

# Restart services
systemctl restart apache2
systemctl restart mysql

# Apache error log
tail -f /var/log/apache2/error.log

Adding More Websites

You can track multiple websites from a single Matomo instance. Go to Administration → Measurables → Manage → Add a new measurable to add additional sites. Each website gets its own tracking code and separate analytics data.

Managing Users

To add team members with different access levels:

1. Go to Administration → System → Users
2. Click Add a new user
3. Set username, email and password
4. Assign permissions: View, Write, Admin or Super User per website

Updates

Matomo shows update notifications in the admin dashboard. To update:

1. Go to Administration → Platform → Marketplace
2. If a core update is available, follow the on-screen instructions

To update system packages via SSH:

apt update && apt upgrade -y

Backups

To create a manual backup of your Matomo database:

mysqldump -u root matomo > /root/matomo-backup-$(date +%F).sql

The Matomo configuration file is located at /var/www/html/config/config.ini.php. Include it in your backups.

Software Included

• Matomo Documentation: matomo.org/docs
• Matomo FAQ: matomo.org/faq
• Matomo Developer Docs: developer.matomo.org