How to Set Up Ghost on Ubuntu server

This guide covers a hands-on experience setting up Ghost, a blogging platform, on an Ubuntu virtual server. This is a minimal setup without Apache or Nginx — just Node.js essentials.

Step 1: Getting Ghost Onto Your Server

Upload Ghost files via an FTP client or clone the repository directly from GitHub:

git clone https://github.com/TryGhost/Ghost.git

Step 2: Installing Ghost

Navigate to the Ghost folder and install dependencies. The --production flag minimizes server footprint by excluding dev dependencies:

cd Ghost
npm install --production

Step 3: Firing Up Ghost

Launch the application in production mode:

npm start --production

Ghost typically runs at http://localhost:2368.

Networking Gotchas

Ghost binds to localhost by default, making it inaccessible from other network devices. To fix this:

1. Find the server IP via ifconfig
2. Edit config.production.json
3. Change host from 127.0.0.1 to the server's external IP (e.g. 192.168.1.100)
4. Restart Ghost

{
    "url": "http://192.168.1.100:2368",
    "server": {
        "port": 2368,
        "host": "192.168.1.100"
    }
}

Wrapping Up

Once the configuration is complete, Ghost will be accessible from other devices on the network. From here you can customize themes, set up your admin panel at /ghost, and configure the blog for production use. If running in Parallels, make sure to verify the network mode settings.