Dashboard for Kubernetes

Use the dashboard for Kubernetes to understand the status of your clusters with an intuitive visual interface. The dashboard works with every connected Kubernetes cluster, whether you deployed them with CI/CD or GitOps.

Configure a dashboard

Configure a dashboard to use it for a given environment. You can configure dashboard for an environment that already exists, or add one when you create an environment.

Prerequisites:

• A GitLab agent for Kubernetes is installed and user_access is configured for the environment’s project or its parent group.

Configure a dashboard for a dynamic environment

To configure a dashboard for a dynamic environment:

• Specify the agent in your .gitlab-ci.yml file. You must specify the full path to the agent configuration project, followed by a colon and the name of the agent.

For example:

deploy_review_app:
  stage: deploy
  script: make deploy
  environment:
    name: review/$CI_COMMIT_REF_SLUG
    kubernetes:
      agent: path/to/agent/project:agent-name

For more information, see the CI/CD YAML syntax reference.

View a dashboard

View a dashboard to see the status of connected clusters. If the k8s_watch_api feature flag is enabled, the status of your Kubernetes resources and Flux reconciliation updates in real time.

To view a configured dashboard:

1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find your project.
2. Select Operate > Environments.
3. Select the environment associated with the agent for Kubernetes.
4. Select the Kubernetes overview tab.

A list of pods is displayed. Select a pod to view its details.

Flux sync status

You can review the sync status of your Flux deployments from a dashboard. To display the deployment status, your dashboard must be able to retrieve the Kustomization and HelmRelease resources, which requires a namespace to be configured for the environment.

GitLab searches the Kustomization and HelmRelease resources specified by the Flux resource dropdown list in the environment settings.

A dashboard displays one of the following status badges:

Trigger Flux reconciliation

You can manually reconcile your deployment with its Flux resources.

To trigger a reconciliation:

1. On a dashboard, select the sync status badge of a Flux deployment.
2. Select Actions ( ) > Trigger reconciliation ( ).

Suspend or resume Flux reconciliation

You can manually suspend or resume your Flux reconciliation from the UI.

To suspend or resume reconciliation:

1. On a dashboard, select the sync status badge of a Flux deployment.
2. Select Actions ( ), then choose one of the following:
   • Suspend reconciliation ( ) to pause the Flux reconciliation.
   • Resume reconciliation ( ) to restart the Flux reconciliation.

View pod logs

View pod logs when you want to quickly understand and troubleshoot issues across your environments from a configured dashboard. You can view logs for each container in a pod.

• Select View logs, then select the container you want to view logs for.

You can also view pod logs from the pod details.

Delete a pod

To restart a failed pod, delete it from the Kubernetes dashboard.

To delete a pod:

1. On the Kubernetes overview tab, find the pod you want to delete.
2. Select Actions ( ) > Delete pod ( ).

You can also delete a pod from the pod details.

Detailed dashboard

The detailed dashboard provides information about the following Kubernetes resources:

• Pods
• Services
• Deployments
• ReplicaSets
• StatefulSets
• DaemonSets
• Jobs
• CronJobs

Each dashboard displays a list of resources with their statuses, namespaces, and age. You can select a resource to open a drawer with more information, including labels and YAML-formatted status, annotations, and spec.

Because of the focus shift described in this issue, work on the detailed dashboard is paused.

To provide feedback on the detailed dashboard, see issue 460279.

View a detailed dashboard

Prerequisites:

• A GitLab agent for Kubernetes is configured and shared with the environment’s project, or its parent group, using the user_access keyword.

The detailed dashboard is not linked from the sidebar navigation. To view a detailed dashboard:

1. Find your agent for Kubernetes ID:
   1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find your project.
   2. Select Operate > Kubernetes clusters.
   3. Copy the numerical ID of the agent you want to access.
2. Go to one of the following URLs, replacing <agent_id> with your agent ID:

   Resource type	URL
   Pods	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/pods
   Services	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/services
   Deployments	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/deployments
   ReplicaSets	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/replicaSets
   StatefulSets	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/statefulSets
   DaemonSets	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/daemonSets
   Jobs	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/jobs
   CronJobs	https://myinstance.gitlab.com/-/kubernetes/<agent_id>/cronJobs

Troubleshooting

When working with the dashboard for Kubernetes, you might encounter the following issues.

User cannot list resource in API group

You might get an error that states Error: services is forbidden: User "gitlab:user:<user-name>" cannot list resource "<resource-name>" in API group "" at the cluster scope.

This error happens when a user is not allowed to do the specified operation in the Kubernetes RBAC.

To resolve, check your RBAC configuration. If the RBAC is properly configured, contact your Kubernetes administrator.

GitLab agent dropdown list is empty

When you configure a new environment, the GitLab agent dropdown list might be empty, even if you have configured Kubernetes clusters.

To populate the GitLab agent dropdown list, grant an agent Kubernetes access with the user_access keyword.