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Karpenter on EKS

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Karpenter

Overview

Karpenter is an intelligent auto-provisioning system that dynamically creates the right-sized compute capacity based on pod requirements.

Installation

# Add Helm repo
helm repo add karpenter https://charts.karpenter.sh
helm repo update
 
# Install Karpenter
helm install karpenter karpenter/karpenter \
  --namespace kube-system \
  --create-namespace \
  --set settings.aws.defaultInstanceProfile=KarpenterNodeRole \
  --set settings.clusterName=my-cluster \
  --set settings.interruptionQueue=my-cluster \
  --wait

NodePool Configuration

apiVersion: karpenter.sh/v1
kind: NodePool
metadata:
  name: default
spec:
  template:
    spec:
      requirements:
        - key:kubernetes.io/arch
          operator: In
          values: [amd64, arm64]
        - key: kubernetes.io/os
          operator: In
          values: [linux]
        - key: karpenter.sh/capacity-type
          operator: In
          values: [on-demand, spot]
      limits:
        cpu: 100
        memory: 100Gi
      consolidation:
        enabled: true
      expireAfter: 720h
  weight: 100

Provisioner with Spot

apiVersion: karpenter.sh/v1
kind: NodePool
metadata:
  name: spot
spec:
  template:
    spec:
      requirements:
        - key: karpenter.sh/capacity-type
          operator: In
          values: [spot]
        - key: kubernetes.io/arch
          operator: In
          values: [amd64]
      limits:
        cpu: 1000
        memory: 1000Gi
      consolidation:
        enabled: true

AWSNodeTemplate

apiVersion: karpenter.k8s.aws/v1
kind: AWSNodeTemplate
metadata:
  name: default
spec:
  subnetSelector:
    karpenter.sh/discovery: my-cluster
  securityGroupSelector:
    karpenter.sh/discovery: my-cluster
  instanceProfile: KarpenterNodeRole
  tags:
    Name: karpenter-node

Key Features

  • Consolidation: Automatically replaces underutilized nodes
  • Expiration: Limits node lifetime to force refresh
  • Multiple instance types: Reduces spot interruption risk
  • Native Spot support: Uses Spot when possible for cost savings

References

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