End-to-End Multi-Tier WordPress Deployment on AWS with Terraform

Automating the deployment of a secure, scalable, and production-ready WordPress application using Infrastructure as Code.

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Overview

This project solves the challenge of manually deploying and configuring multi-tier web applications, which is often slow, error-prone, and difficult to replicate. It provides a fully automated, production-grade Infrastructure as Code (IaC) solution using Terraform to provision a secure and scalable WordPress site on AWS.

The result is a robust, three-tier architecture that can be deployed, updated, or destroyed in minutes with just a few commands, ensuring consistency and reliability.

Architecture & Features

The infrastructure is designed with security and modularity as top priorities, following AWS best practices.

graph TD

%% Internet Layer
A["Internet User"] --> B["Internet Gateway"]

%% VPC Boundary
subgraph VPC["VPC (10.0.0.0/16)"]

    %% Public Subnet
    subgraph PUB["Public Subnet (us-east-1a)"]
        RT1["Route Table (Routes to IGW)"] --> EC2["EC2 Web Server (WordPress Files)"]
    end

    %% Private Subnets
    subgraph PRIV["Private Subnets (Multi-AZ)"]
        RT2["Route Table (Routes to NAT)"] --> RDS["Amazon RDS (MySQL Database)"]
    end

    %% Connections
    EC2 -. "Port 3306 via Security Group" .-> RDS
end

%% External Connection
B --> VPC

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Key Features

• Secure Network Foundation: Deploys a custom VPC with public subnets for web servers and private subnets for the database to prevent direct internet access to sensitive data.
• Automated Provisioning: An EC2 instance is automatically provisioned and configured using a user_data shell script, which installs Apache, a modern PHP version, and WordPress without any manual intervention.
• Managed & Resilient Database: Provisions a multi-AZ Amazon RDS (MySQL) instance for high availability and simplified database management.
• Modular & Reusable Code: The Terraform configuration is broken down into clean, reusable modules for networking, compute, and database layers, making the code maintainable and scalable.
• Granular Security: Utilizes AWS Security Groups to act as stateful firewalls, ensuring the web server can only accept HTTP/SSH traffic and the database can only accept connections from the web server.
• Secure Credential Management: Manages sensitive information like database passwords using a terraform.tfvars file, which is explicitly excluded from version control via .gitignore.

Repository Structure

The project is organized into logical modules for clean separation of concerns.

.
├── modules/
│   ├── compute/              # Handles EC2, Security Group, and WordPress installation
│   │   ├── install_wordpress.sh
│   │   ├── main.tf
│   │   ├── outputs.tf
│   │   └── variables.tf
│   ├── database/             # Handles RDS Instance, Subnet Group, and Security Group
│   │   ├── main.tf
│   │   ├── outputs.tf
│   │   └── variables.tf
│   └── network/              # Handles VPC, Subnets, Gateways, and Route Tables
│       ├── main.tf
│       ├── outputs.tf
│       └── variables.tf
├── main.tf                   # Root module: orchestrates the network, database, and compute modules
├── terraform.tfvars.example  # Example variables file (DO NOT COMMIT YOUR ACTUAL .tfvars)
├── .gitignore                # Ensures sensitive files are not committed
└── README.md                 # This file

Terraform AWS WordPress Project

This project deploys a secure, automated WordPress environment on AWS using Terraform.

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Tech Stack

Component	Description
Terraform	Infrastructure as Code tool for building, changing, and versioning infrastructure.
AWS (Amazon Web Services)	Cloud provider for all resources.
VPC	Isolated cloud network.
EC2	Virtual servers for hosting WordPress.
RDS	Managed relational database service for MySQL.
Security Groups	Virtual firewalls controlling inbound and outbound traffic.
Internet Gateway & NAT Gateway	Manage network traffic between public and private subnets.
Shell Scripting	Automates EC2 configuration via user_data.
Git & GitHub	Version control and collaboration.

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Setup and Deployment Instructions

Follow these steps to deploy the infrastructure in your own AWS account.

1. Prerequisites

• An active AWS Account
• Terraform installed on your local machine
• AWS CLI installed and configured

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2. Clone the Repository

git clone https://github.com/githubabhay2003/aws-wordpress-terraform-project.git
cd aws-wordpress-terraform-project

3. Configure AWS Credentials:

Ensure your AWS CLI is configured with credentials that have sufficient permissions to create the resources.

aws configure

4. Prepare Terraform Variables:

Create a file for your secret variables. This file is git-ignored and should never be committed.

# Rename the example file
mv terraform.tfvars.example terraform.tfvars
# Edit terraform.tfvars and provide your own secure values
# For example:
# db_password = "YourVerySecurePassword123!"

5. Generate an SSH Key Pair:

This key allows secure connection to the EC2 instance.

ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 2048 -f ~/.ssh/wordpress-key
Then, update terraform.tfvars with the path to the public key:

ssh_key_path = "~/.ssh/wordpress-key.pub"

6. Initialize and Deploy:

# Initialize Terraform and download the required providers
terraform init

# (Optional) Preview the changes Terraform will make
terraform plan

# Apply the configuration to deploy the infrastructure
terraform apply -auto-approve

7. Verify Deployment:

After the apply is complete, Terraform will output the public URL of your WordPress site. Wait about 5 minutes for the installation script to complete, then navigate to the URL in your browser.

8. Cleanup:

Important: To avoid incurring costs, destroy all the resources when you are finished.

terraform destroy -auto-approve

Usage Example

Once deployed, the wordpress_url output will direct you to the WordPress installation page.

(Note: You can replace this with your own screenshot after a successful deployment)

Contributing

Contributions, issues, and feature requests are welcome! Feel free to check the issues page.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

Author & Contact

Abhay Kumar Saini

GitHub: @githubabhay2003

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhay-kumar-saini-571891264/