Question: I paid for an SSL certificate from Namecheap, I think it was certified by ComodoSSL. It cost me 7$, it took them a week to activate and I had to do it myself from SSH while editing my site's configuration files.

Then a friend made me aware of [Let's Encrypt](https://letsencrypt.org/) who not only give out free SSL certificates, but they can be installed by running a single command.

I'm sure I'm missing something here, but why would I want to pay for an SSL certificate when I can get one installed easily, for free, with automatic renewal set up?

Answer: 
Let's Encrypt is superior in many ways, including the ones that you have mentioned, such as:

1. It's free. Hard to get past that.
2. It has automatic renewal (I'm sure it's not JUST exclusive with Let's Encrypt, however)
3. It's pretty easy to set up.
4. Google and many others support it as a trusted CA, which is a huge deal when it comes to SEO and security.

**However, there are a couple of cons.**

1. The verification system that it works on to make sure that, you, well, own the site, is not compatible with some website hosts, I have had a fair amount of headache trying to get Let's Encrypt work on InfinityFree and I just accepted the fate that I couldn't do it.
2. You don't get any kind of insurance that says "If this breaks, we'll help you out" since it's open-source, you are on your own if Let's Encrypt doesn't work or is somehow cracked.
LetsEncrypt certificates are great. I use them myself instead of buying certificates. There are a few drawbacks:

* LetsEncrypt certificates only last 3 months. Most purchased certificates are good for one or two years. That means that you absolutely need an automated process in place to renew your certificates or it is going to be too easy to forget.
* LetsEncrypt only offer the lowest validation type of certificate. Domain Validation (DV) only validates that the owner of the certificate has control over the domain. Organization Validation (OV) certificates also check the documentation of the person or company requesting the certificate. Extended Validation (EV) certificates require even further checks. The better your certificate, the harder it is to be forged, and the more your site's authenticity can be trusted because of it. In practice, browsers only give a visual nod to EV certs, usually showing something in green in the address bar for them. Up to this point, most users don't know or care about the different validation levels.
* Wild card certificates are a bit harder to obtain from LetsEncrypt. From other places you generally just pay more money. LetsEncrypt requires DNS validation for wildcard certificates.

Historically, security certificates have always cost something. Other companies that have offered free certificates have come and gone. I used to use StartSSL which offered a single domain free certificate until they did some shady stuff and browsers stopped trusting their certificates. LetsEncrypt has fewer limits than previous free certificate vendors and is far more automated. It also has some big supporters such as the EFF, Mozilla, Chrome, and Cisco. See <https://letsencrypt.org/sponsors/> It appears to be well enough run that I expect it to be around for years.