.htaccess doesn't work on ubuntu droplet

By default the LAMP install will disable usage of the .htaccess file.

You need to edit the configuration file for your virtual host.

 $ nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf

Change the <VirtualHost> directive to look something like this. The important part is AllowOverride All, as this tells Apache that the directory can override default settings using a .htaccess file.

<VirtualHost *>
     ServerName cyan.red
     ServerAlias www.cyan.red
     DocumentRoot /var/www/html

     <Directory /var/www/html>
        Options FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride all
        Require all granted
     </Directory>

     ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
     CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

Now make sure the website is enabled.

  $ a2ensite 000-default.conf

Also make sure that the rewrite mod is enabled.

  $ a2enmod rewrite

Now restart Apache

   $ service apache2 restart

In my case, I was still hitting my head against the wall even after adding AllowOverride all to <VirtualHost *:443>conf.

I discovered you’ll need to remove AllowOverride all from your <VirtualHost *:80> conf if it’s been specified there.

None of this worked for me. What did work was to enable “AllowOverride all” in the apache2.conf file in /etc/apache2. For me it was on line 172 of that file. I tried everything else to eliminate my pages from giving a 404 when visiting pages but the homepage.