There are many tutorials for setting up mod_rewrite for Apache, but most of them are missing one critical step. To be honest, I’m writing this as much for myself as I am for anyone else. I’m tired of looking around for the missing step every time I setup mod_rewrite on a new machine. So here it is. First, turn on the rewrite module using this command:

sudo a2enmod rewrite

Next, find the following file and open it as an administrator:

/etc/apache2/apache2.conf

In the /var/www/ section, change:

AllowOverride None

To:

AllowOverride All

Finally, restart Apache with the following command:

sudo service apache2 restart

That’s it!

Disclaimer: I tried a bunch of different methods before finally getting mod_rewrite to work properly. I believe these are the only steps that actually made a difference, but there is a slight possibility that something else I did had some effect as well. If these steps don’t work for you, feel free to comment and I’ll see what I can do to help.