Virtual Kubernetes Clusters

Clusters that run inside regular namespaces,  cut costs,
and solve Kubernetes multi-tenancy.

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vCluster uses k3s as its API server to makevirtual clusters super lightweight & cost-efficient

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SSO & Audit Logging, Controller & CRDs and Pro Distro

See vCluster in Action

Why Virtual Clusters?

Virtual clusters have their own API server which makes them much more powerful and better isolated than namespaces, but they are also much cheaper than creating separate "real" Kubernetes clusters.

loft

Isolation

Access for Tenants

Cost

Resource Sharing

Overhead

Separate Namespace

very weak

very restricted

very cheap

easy

very low

strong

vcluster admin

cheap

easy

very low

Separate Cluster

very strong

cluster admin

expensive

very hard

very high

Virtual Kubernetes Clusters

For Secure Multi-Tenancy, Reduced Cost & Simplified Operations

Get Started

Learn more

Secure Multi-Tenancy

vCluster unlocks a great developer experience for anyone having to develop against Kubernetes as a deployment target.

Cluster Scaling

If you are hitting the scalability limits of k8s because you are running a large-scale multi- tenant cluster, you can now split up and effectively shared your clusters into vclusters.

Cluster Simulations

You want to test a new ingress controller or enable a Kubernetes alpha flag without impacting your cluster operations? Vcluster will let you simulate such situations virtually.

Get Started

Automatically creates a kube-context on your local machine, so you can now use kubectl with your virtual cluster.

# amd64 (intel mac) 
curl -L -o vcluster "https://github.com/loftsh/vcluster/releases/latest/download/vcluster-darwin-amd64" && chmod +x vcluster;sudo mv vcluster /usr/local/bin;
# arm64 (silicon mac) 
curl -L -o vcluster "https://github.com/loftsh/vcluster/releases/latest/download/vcluster-darwin-arm64" && chmod +x vcluster;sudo mv vcluster /usr/local/bin;

Install vCluster CLI

vcluster create vcluster-1

Create vCluster

kubectl create namespace ns-inside-vcluster
helm install ./chart
kubectl get pods --all-namespaces

Use the vCluster

Install vCluster CLI

vcluster create vcluster-1

Create vCluster

kubectl create namespace ns-inside-vcluster
helm install ./chart
kubectl get pods --all-namespaces

Use the vCluster

Install vCluster CLI

vcluster create vcluster-1

Create vCluster

kubectl create namespace ns-inside-vcluster
helm install ./chart
kubectl get pods --all-namespaces

Use the vCluster

How does it work?

Virtual clusters run inside namespaces of other clusters. They have a separate API server and a separate data store, so every Kubernetes object you create in the vcluster only exists inside the vcluster.

First, let's create a few namespaces inside our new vcluster:

kubectl create namespace ns-1G

Have a question?

Now, we can deploy something into one of the namespaces of our vcluster:

kubectl create deployment nginx --image=nginx -n ns-1

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The controller manager of our vcluster will create the pods for this deployment.

kubectl get pods -n ns-1

Have a question?

We can see pods being scheduled inside the vcluster although the vcluster does not have a scheduler and does not have any real nodes.

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BUT, where do these pods get scheduled to?

If we are checking the underlying host namespace where our vcluster is running ...

kubectl get pods -n ns-1

... then we can see that the pods are actually running inside the underlying cluster while every other high-level Kubernetes resource such as deployments or CRDs exist only inside the vcluster.

Have a question?

BUT, where do these pods get scheduled to?

If we are checking the underlying host namespace where our vcluster is running ...

kubectl get pods -n ns-1

... then we can see that the pods are actually running inside the underlying cluster while every other high-level Kubernetes resource such as deployments or CRDs exist only inside the vcluster.

Have a question?

Star the project on GitHub, open issues and pull requests. Any contribution is welcome.

Support on Github

Join the conversation about vclusters on Slack and get help from the project maintainers.

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