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AWS Documentation » Amazon EKS » User Guide » Managing Cluster Authentication » Installing aws-iam-authenticator

Installing aws-iam-authenticator

Amazon EKS uses IAM to provide authentication to your Kubernetes cluster through the AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes. You can configure the stock kubectl client to work with Amazon EKS by installing the AWS IAM Authenticator for Kubernetes and modifying your kubectl configuration file to use it for authentication.

macOSLinuxWindows
macOS

To install aws-iam-authenticator with Homebrew

The easiest way to install the aws-iam-authenticator is with Homebrew.

  1. If you do not already have Homebrew installed on your Mac, install it with the following command. 

    /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

  2. Install the aws-iam-authenticator with the following command. 

    brew install aws-iam-authenticator

  3. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works. 

    aws-iam-authenticator help

To install aws-iam-authenticator on macOS

You can also install the AWS-vended version of the aws-iam-authenticator by following these steps.

  1. Download the Amazon EKS-vended aws-iam-authenticator binary from Amazon S3: 

    curl -o aws-iam-authenticator https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/darwin/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 sum provided in the same bucket prefix.

    1. Download the SHA-256 sum for your system.

      curl -o aws-iam-authenticator.sha256 https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/darwin/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator.sha256

    2. Check the SHA-256 sum for your downloaded binary.

      openssl sha1 -sha256 aws-iam-authenticator

    3. Compare the generated SHA-256 sum in the command output against your downloaded aws-iam-authenticator.sha256 file. The two should match.

  3. Apply execute permissions to the binary.

    chmod +x ./aws-iam-authenticator

  4. Copy the binary to a folder in your $PATH. We recommend creating a $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator and ensuring that $HOME/bin comes first in your $PATH. 

    mkdir -p $HOME/bin && cp ./aws-iam-authenticator $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator && export PATH=$HOME/bin:$PATH

  5. Add $HOME/bin to your PATH environment variable. 

    echo 'export PATH=$HOME/bin:$PATH' >> ~/.bash_profile

  6. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works. 

    aws-iam-authenticator help
Linux

To install aws-iam-authenticator on Linux

  1. Download the Amazon EKS-vended aws-iam-authenticator binary from Amazon S3: 

    curl -o aws-iam-authenticator https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/linux/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 sum provided in the same bucket prefix.

    1. Download the SHA-256 sum for your system.

      curl -o aws-iam-authenticator.sha256 https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/linux/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator.sha256

    2. Check the SHA-256 sum for your downloaded binary.

      openssl sha1 -sha256 aws-iam-authenticator

    3. Compare the generated SHA-256 sum in the command output against your downloaded aws-iam-authenticator.sha256 file. The two should match.

  3. Apply execute permissions to the binary.

    chmod +x ./aws-iam-authenticator

  4. Copy the binary to a folder in your $PATH. We recommend creating a $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator and ensuring that $HOME/bin comes first in your $PATH. 

    mkdir -p $HOME/bin && cp ./aws-iam-authenticator $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator && export PATH=$HOME/bin:$PATH

  5. Add $HOME/bin to your PATH environment variable. 

    echo 'export PATH=$HOME/bin:$PATH' >> ~/.bashrc

  6. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works. 

    aws-iam-authenticator help
Windows

To install aws-iam-authenticator on Windows with Chocolatey

  1. If you do not already have Chocolatey installed on your Windows system, see Installing Chocolatey.

  2. Open a PowerShell terminal window and install the aws-iam-authenticator package with the following command: 

    choco install -y aws-iam-authenticator

  3. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works. 

    aws-iam-authenticator help

To install aws-iam-authenticator on Windows

  1. Open a PowerShell terminal window and download the Amazon EKS-vended aws-iam-authenticator binary from Amazon S3: 

    curl -o aws-iam-authenticator.exe https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/windows/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator.exe

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 sum provided in the same bucket prefix.

    1. Download the SHA-256 sum for your system.

      curl -o aws-iam-authenticator.sha256 https://amazon-eks.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1.14.6/2019-08-22/bin/windows/amd64/aws-iam-authenticator.exe.sha256

    2. Check the SHA-256 sum for your downloaded binary.

      Get-FileHash aws-iam-authenticator.exe

    3. Compare the generated SHA-256 sum in the command output against your downloaded SHA-256 file. The two should match, although the PowerShell output will be uppercase.

  3. Copy the binary to a folder in your PATH. If you have an existing directory in your PATH that you use for command line utilities, copy the binary to that directory. Otherwise, complete the following steps.

    1. Create a new directory for your command line binaries, such as C:\bin.

    2. Copy the aws-iam-authenticator.exe binary to your new directory.

    3. Edit your user or system PATH environment variable to add the new directory to your PATH.

    4. Close your PowerShell terminal and open a new one to pick up the new PATH variable.

  4. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works. 

    aws-iam-authenticator help

If you have an existing Amazon EKS cluster, create a kubeconfig file for that cluster. For more information, see Create a kubeconfig for Amazon EKS. Otherwise, see Creating an Amazon EKS Cluster to create a new Amazon EKS cluster.