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Certificate Verification: Error (20): Unable to Get Local User Certificate
Certificate Verification: Error (20): Unable to Get Local User Certificate
Toshi Dávila avatar
Written by Toshi Dávila
Updated over a month ago

When OpenSSL returns the error:

Error (20): Unable to Get Local User Certificate

the program was unable to verify the certificate’s issuer or the topmost certificate of a provided chain. This can happen for a few reasons:

  • The certificate chain or certificate wasn’t provided by the other side or was self-signed.

  • The root certificate is not in the local database of trusted root certificates.

  • The local database of trusted root certificates was not given or queried by OpenSSL. To explicitly give the path to the certificates, use -CApath or -CAfile.

For example, in Debian or Ubuntu, it would look like this:

-CApath /etc/ssl/certs/ 
-CAfile /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt


The result is then one of the following examples:

openssl s_client -connect example.com:443 -CApath /etc/ssl/certs/ 
openssl s_client -connect example.com:443 -CAfile /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt


While you entered correct Root and Sub CA Root certificates, make sure that the SSLCACertificateFile has the full chain inside the file.


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