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83 CommandsDevOps Quick Reference

Kubernetes (kubectl) Cheatsheet

Production kubectl cheatsheet for CKA prep, cluster administration, Pod debugging, Deployments, Services, RBAC, and Helm.

Sections:Cluster Info (10)Pods (13)Deployments (12)Services & Networking (11)Namespaces (8)ConfigMaps & Secrets (9)Storage (8)Troubleshooting (12)

Showing 83 of 83 commands

Cluster Info

10 commands

kubectl version --clientbeginner

Show the installed kubectl client version without querying the cluster

kubectl cluster-infobeginner

Display the cluster control plane and core service endpoints

kubectl get nodesbeginner

List all nodes and their readiness status in the current cluster

kubectl get nodes -o widebeginner

List nodes with extra details like internal IPs, OS image, and container runtime

kubectl describe node <name>intermediate

Show detailed capacity, conditions, labels, taints, and pod allocation for a node

kubectl top nodesintermediate

View live CPU and memory usage for nodes from Metrics Server

kubectl config viewintermediate

Print the merged kubeconfig with clusters, users, and contexts

kubectl config current-contextbeginner

Show the currently selected kubeconfig context

kubectl config get-contextsbeginner

List all available kubeconfig contexts and highlight the active one

kubectl config use-context <ctx>beginner

Switch kubectl to a different cluster and user context

Pods

13 commands

kubectl get podsbeginner

List pods in the current namespace with basic readiness and status info

kubectl get pods -Abeginner

List pods across every namespace in the cluster

kubectl get pods -n <ns>beginner

List pods only in a specific namespace

kubectl get pods -o widebeginner

Show pods with extra details like node placement and pod IPs

kubectl describe pod <name>intermediate

Inspect pod metadata, container states, events, probes, and mounts

kubectl logs <pod>beginner

Fetch logs from the main container in a pod

kubectl logs <pod> -fbeginner

Stream logs from a pod in real time

kubectl logs <pod> --previousintermediate

View logs from the previously terminated container instance in a restarting pod

kubectl exec -it <pod> -- /bin/shintermediate

Open an interactive shell inside a pod using the default container

kubectl exec -it <pod> -c <container> -- bashintermediate

Open a shell inside a specific container in a multi-container pod

kubectl delete pod <name>beginner

Delete a pod and let its controller recreate it if managed

kubectl run nginx --image=nginxbeginner

Create a quick standalone pod directly from an image

kubectl port-forward pod/<name> 8080:80intermediate

Forward a local port to a pod port for direct debugging access

Deployments

12 commands

kubectl get deploymentsbeginner

List deployments in the current namespace with desired and ready replica counts

kubectl describe deployment <name>intermediate

Inspect a deployment strategy, pod template, rollout conditions, and events

kubectl create deployment nginx --image=nginxbeginner

Create a deployment from a single image directly from the CLI

kubectl scale deployment <name> --replicas=3beginner

Change the number of desired pod replicas for a deployment

kubectl set image deployment/<name> <container>=<image>:tagintermediate

Update a container image and trigger a rolling rollout

kubectl rollout status deployment/<name>intermediate

Watch the rollout until the deployment successfully completes or fails

kubectl rollout history deployment/<name>intermediate

Show previous rollout revisions for a deployment

kubectl rollout undo deployment/<name>intermediate

Roll back the deployment to the previous revision

kubectl rollout undo deployment/<name> --to-revision=2advanced

Roll back the deployment to a specific stored revision

kubectl delete deployment <name>beginner

Delete a deployment and its managed ReplicaSets and pods

kubectl apply -f deployment.yamlbeginner

Create or update a deployment declaratively from a manifest file

kubectl edit deployment <name>advanced

Open the live deployment manifest in your editor for an immediate change

Services & Networking

11 commands

kubectl get svcbeginner

List services in the current namespace with type and cluster IP

kubectl get svc -Abeginner

List services across all namespaces

kubectl describe svc <name>intermediate

Inspect service ports, selectors, endpoints, and load balancer details

kubectl expose deployment <name> --port=80 --type=ClusterIPbeginner

Expose a deployment internally within the cluster using a ClusterIP service

kubectl expose deployment <name> --port=80 --type=LoadBalancerintermediate

Expose a deployment externally through a cloud load balancer

kubectl expose deployment <name> --port=80 --type=NodePortintermediate

Expose a deployment on a static port on each cluster node

kubectl get ingressbeginner

List ingress resources and their configured hosts and addresses

kubectl describe ingress <name>intermediate

Inspect ingress rules, TLS configuration, and backend service routing

kubectl get endpointsintermediate

Show which pod IPs are currently backing each service

kubectl port-forward svc/<name> 8080:80intermediate

Forward a local port to a service for testing without external exposure

kubectl delete svc <name>beginner

Delete a service resource by name

Namespaces

8 commands

kubectl get namespacesbeginner

List all namespaces in the cluster

kubectl create namespace <name>beginner

Create a new namespace for an application, team, or environment

kubectl delete namespace <name>intermediate

Delete a namespace and everything contained inside it

kubectl get all -n <namespace>beginner

List the main workload and service resources in a target namespace

kubectl config set-context --current --namespace=<name>intermediate

Set the default namespace for the current context to reduce repeated -n flags

kubectl get pods --all-namespacesbeginner

List pods across every namespace using the long-form namespace flag

kubectl get quota -n <namespace>intermediate

View resource quota usage and hard limits for a namespace

kubectl describe namespace <name>intermediate

Inspect a namespace including labels, annotations, quotas, and limit ranges

ConfigMaps & Secrets

9 commands

kubectl get configmapsbeginner

List ConfigMaps in the current namespace

kubectl describe configmap <name>intermediate

Show the keys and metadata stored in a ConfigMap

kubectl create configmap my-config --from-literal=key=valuebeginner

Create a ConfigMap from one or more literal key-value pairs

kubectl create configmap my-config --from-file=config.envintermediate

Create a ConfigMap from a local file such as an env file or config artifact

kubectl get secretsbeginner

List secrets in the current namespace

kubectl describe secret <name>intermediate

Inspect secret metadata and available keys without printing decoded values

kubectl create secret generic my-secret --from-literal=password=abcbeginner

Create a generic secret from literal key-value pairs

kubectl create secret docker-registry regcred --docker-server=... --docker-username=... --docker-password=...advanced

Create an image pull secret for a private container registry

kubectl get secret <name> -o jsonpath='{.data.key}' | base64 -dadvanced

Decode a specific secret key value from base64 for troubleshooting

Storage

8 commands

kubectl get pvbeginner

List cluster-wide persistent volumes and their binding state

kubectl get pvcbeginner

List persistent volume claims in the current namespace

kubectl get pvc -n <namespace>beginner

List persistent volume claims in a specific namespace

kubectl describe pv <name>intermediate

Inspect a persistent volume including reclaim policy, capacity, and claim binding

kubectl describe pvc <name>intermediate

Inspect a claim including requested size, access modes, and mounted workloads

kubectl delete pvc <name>intermediate

Delete a persistent volume claim and release its bound volume according to policy

kubectl get storageclassbeginner

List available storage classes and identify the default provisioner

kubectl describe storageclass <name>intermediate

Inspect provisioner parameters, reclaim policy, and binding mode for a storage class

Troubleshooting

12 commands

kubectl get events --sort-by=.metadata.creationTimestampintermediate

List cluster events in chronological order to surface the newest failures last

kubectl get events -n <ns> --field-selector=reason=Failedintermediate

Filter namespace events down to failure-related entries only

kubectl describe pod <name> | grep -A 10 Eventsadvanced

Extract the events section from a pod description for quick CLI triage

kubectl logs <pod> --since=1hintermediate

Show logs generated within the last hour to narrow noisy output

kubectl logs <pod> --tail=100beginner

Show only the most recent log lines from a pod

kubectl top podsintermediate

View CPU and memory usage for pods in the current namespace

kubectl top pods -n <namespace>intermediate

View CPU and memory usage for pods in a specific namespace

kubectl get pods --field-selector=status.phase=Pendingintermediate

List only pods that are still waiting to schedule or start

kubectl get pods --field-selector=status.phase=Failedintermediate

List pods whose last phase is Failed for cleanup or investigation

kubectl drain <node> --ignore-daemonsetsadvanced

Safely evict workloads from a node before maintenance or termination

kubectl cordon <node>advanced

Mark a node unschedulable so new pods are not placed on it

kubectl uncordon <node>advanced

Mark a node schedulable again after maintenance is complete