Kind

Overview

Kind (Kubernetes IN Docker) is a tool for running local Kubernetes clusters using Docker containers as nodes. It is primarily used for testing Kubernetes itself or for developing Kubernetes applications in a local environment.

⚠️ WARNING

This documentation assumes you are not using sysbox or dockerd as your Docker runtime.

Custom Cluster Configuration

Custom configurations can be stored in a yaml file of your choice. To create a cluster with custom configurations, for example in my-config.yaml, run the following command:

touch my-config.yaml
# ... edit configurations as described below
# ... before deploying the cluster
kind create cluster --config my-config.yaml

Adjust the Cluster IP

By default, a Kind cluster is only accessible at 127.0.0.1 (from the current host). When using a remote Docker engine (or a mapped docker.sock), you must adjust this setting, as 127.0.0.1 resolves to the internal address of your workspace.

To make the cluster accessible on the host network, change the listening address to 0.0.0.0 (or the appropriate IP, if using a remote engine) in your cluster configuration file:

kind: Cluster
apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
networking:
  apiServerAddress: 0.0.0.0
# ... additional configurations follow

Update KUBECONFIG

After cluster deployment, update the KUBECONFIG to communicate with the API server using the host IP for the cluster.server address:

apiVersion: v1
clusters:
- cluster:
    server: https://192.168.1.120:6443
    certificate-authority-data: DATA+OMITTED
  name: created-by-kind
# ... additional configurations follow