Create kubeconfig file automatically Create kubeconfig manually

Create a `kubeconfig` for Amazon EKS

In this section, you create a kubeconfig file for your cluster (or update an existing one).

This section offers two procedures to create or update your kubeconfig file. You can quickly create or update a kubeconfig file with the AWS CLI update-kubeconfig command automatically by using the AWS CLI, or you can create a kubeconfig file manually using the AWS CLI or the aws-iam-authenticator.

Amazon EKS uses the aws eks get-token command, available in version 1.16.156 or later of the AWS CLI or the AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes with kubectl for cluster authentication. If you have installed the AWS CLI on your system, then by default the AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes uses the same credentials that are returned with the following command:


aws sts get-caller-identity

For more information, see Configuring the AWS CLI in the AWS Command Line Interface User Guide.

Create `kubeconfig` file automatically

To create your kubeconfig file with the AWS CLI

Make sure that you have version 1.23.11 or 2.6.3 or later installed. To install or upgrade the AWS CLI, see Installing the AWS CLI in the AWS Command Line Interface User Guide.

Note
Your system's Python version must be 2.7.9 or later. Otherwise, you receive hostname doesn't match errors with AWS CLI calls to Amazon EKS.

You can check your AWS CLI version with the following command:
```
aws --version
```
Important
Package managers such yum, apt-get, or Homebrew for macOS are often behind several versions of the AWS CLI. To ensure that you have the latest version, see Installing the AWS CLI in the AWS Command Line Interface User Guide.
Create or update a kubeconfig file for your cluster. Replace the example values with your own.
- By default, the resulting configuration file is created at the default kubeconfig path (.kube) in your home directory or merged with an existing config file at that location. You can specify another path with the --kubeconfig option.
- You can specify an IAM role ARN with the --role-arn option to use for authentication when you issue kubectl commands. Otherwise, the IAM entity in your default AWS CLI or SDK credential chain is used. You can view your default AWS CLI or SDK identity by running the aws sts get-caller-identity command.
- For more information, see the help page with the aws eks update-kubeconfig help command or see update-kubeconfig in the AWS CLI Command Reference.
Note
To run the following command, you must have permission to use the eks:DescribeCluster API action with the cluster that you specify. For more information, see Amazon EKS identity-based policy examples.
```
aws eks update-kubeconfig --region region-code --name cluster-name
```
Test your configuration.
```
kubectl get svc
```
Note
If you receive any authorization or resource type errors, see Unauthorized or access denied (kubectl) in the troubleshooting section.

The example output is as follows.
```
NAME             TYPE        CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)   AGE
svc/kubernetes   ClusterIP   10.100.0.1   <none>        443/TCP   1m
```

Create `kubeconfig` manually

To create your kubeconfig file manually

Set values for a few variables by replacing the example values with your own and then running the modified commands.
```
export region_code=region-code
export cluster_name=my-cluster
export account_id=111122223333
```

Retrieve the endpoint for your cluster and store the value in a variable.


cluster_endpoint=$(aws eks describe-cluster \
    --region $region_code \
    --name $cluster_name \
    --query "cluster.endpoint" \
    --output text)

Retrieve the Base64-encoded certificate data required to communicate with your cluster and store the value in a variable.


certificate_data=$(aws eks describe-cluster \
    --region $region_code \
    --name $cluster_name \
    --query "cluster.certificateAuthority.data" \
    --output text)

Create the default ~/.kube directory if it doesn't already exist.
```
mkdir -p ~/.kube
```

Run the command for your preferred client token method (AWS CLI or AWS IAM authenticator for Kubernetes) to create the config file in the ~/.kube directory. You can specify the following before running one of the commands by modifying the command to include the following:

An IAM role – Remove the # at the start of the lines under args:. Replace my-role with the name of the IAM role that you want to perform cluster operations with instead of the default AWS credential provider chain. For more information, see Set up kubectl to use authentication tokens provided by AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes on GitHub.
An AWS CLI named profile – Remove the # at the start of the env: line, and remove # at the start of the lines under it. Replace aws-profile with the name of the profile to use. If you don't specify a profile, then the default profile is used. For additional information, see Specifying Credentials & Using AWS Profiles on GitHub.

AWS CLI

Prerequisite

Version 1.16.156 or later of the AWS CLI must be installed on your device.


#!/bin/bash
read -r -d '' KUBECONFIG <<EOF
apiVersion: v1
clusters:
- cluster:
    certificate-authority-data: $certificate_data
    server: $cluster_endpoint
  name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
contexts:
- context:
    cluster: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
    user: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
  name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
current-context: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
kind: Config
preferences: {}
users:
- name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
  user:
    exec:
      apiVersion: client.authentication.k8s.io/v1beta1
      command: aws
      args:
        - --region
        - $region_code
        - eks
        - get-token
        - --cluster-name
        - $cluster_name
        # - "- --role-arn"
        # - "arn:aws:iam::$account_id:role/my-role"
      # env:
        # - name: "AWS_PROFILE"
        #   value: "aws-profile"
EOF
echo "${KUBECONFIG}" > ~/.kube/config

AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes

Prerequisite

The AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes must be installed on your device. To install it, see Installing aws-iam-authenticator.


#!/bin/bash
read -r -d '' KUBECONFIG <<EOF
apiVersion: v1
clusters:
- cluster:
    server: $cluster_endpoint
    certificate-authority-data: $certificate_data
  name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
contexts:
- context:
    cluster: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
    user: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
  name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
current-context: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
kind: Config
preferences: {}
users:
- name: arn:aws:eks:$region_code:$account_id:cluster/$cluster_name
  user:
    exec:
      apiVersion: client.authentication.k8s.io/v1beta1
      command: aws-iam-authenticator
      args:
        - "token"
        - "-i"
        - "$cluster_name"
        # - "- --role-arn"
        # - "arn:aws:iam::$account_id:role/my-role"
      # env:
        # - name: "AWS_PROFILE"
        #   value: "aws-profile"
EOF
echo "${KUBECONFIG}" > ~/.kube/config

Add the file path to your KUBECONFIG environment variable so that kubectl knows where to look for your cluster configuration.
- For Bash shells on macOS or Linux:
```
export KUBECONFIG=$KUBECONFIG:~/.kube/config
```
- For PowerShell on Windows:
```
$ENV:KUBECONFIG="{0};{1}" -f  $ENV:KUBECONFIG, "$ENV:userprofile\.kube\config"
```

(Optional) Add the configuration to your shell initialization file so that it is configured when you open a shell.

For Bash shells on macOS:


echo 'export KUBECONFIG=$KUBECONFIG:~/.kube/config' >> ~/.bash_profile

For Bash shells on Linux:


echo 'export KUBECONFIG=$KUBECONFIG:~/.kube/config' >> ~/.bashrc

For PowerShell on Windows:


[System.Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable('KUBECONFIG', $ENV:KUBECONFIG, 'Machine')

Test your configuration.
```
kubectl get svc
```
Note
If you receive any authorization or resource type errors, see Unauthorized or access denied (kubectl) in the troubleshooting section.

The example output is as follows.
```
NAME             TYPE        CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)   AGE
svc/kubernetes   ClusterIP   10.100.0.1   <none>        443/TCP   1m
```

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Document Conventions

OIDC identity provider authentication

Installing aws-iam-authenticator

Create a kubeconfig for Amazon EKS

Create kubeconfig file automatically

Create kubeconfig manually

Create a `kubeconfig` for Amazon EKS

Create `kubeconfig` file automatically

Create `kubeconfig` manually