With Smart Alerts for Kubernetes, you can proactively receive alerts by selecting a Kubernetes entity type, such as a cluster, pod, or deployment, and then choosing a specific metric to monitor for that entity. With this feature you have a focused view of infrastructure Smart Alerts specifically for your Kubernetes environment.
This focused approach helps Kubernetes administrators and SREs monitor their container orchestration platform without the noise of non-Kubernetes infrastructure alerts. Smart Alerts for Kubernetes includes the following features:
A specialized Kubernetes-focused view of infrastructure Smart Alerts that filters and displays only alerts that are related to Kubernetes entity types for you to manage.
Streamlined entity selection, which gives you the ability to choose from Kubernetes-specific entity types including clusters, nodes, pods, deployments, control plane components, ArgoCD applications, KubeCost, and more.
Centralized Kubernetes monitoring for access to all Kubernetes alerts from the Kubernetes dashboard.
Leverage all infrastructure Smart Alert features including custom aggregation, per-entity alerting, forecast alerting, and multi-severity thresholds.
Accessing Kubernetes Smart Alerts
You can access and create Kubernetes Smart Alerts from multiple locations in the Instana UI:
From the Kubernetes Platform view
From a Kubernetes Cluster dashboard
From a Kubernetes Namespace dashboard
From the Kubernetes Platform view:
From the navigation menu in the Instana UI, select Platforms.
Select Kubernetes.
Click the Smart Alerts tab.
Figure 1. Kubernetes Smart Alerts view
From a Kubernetes Cluster dashboard:
Navigate to a specific Kubernetes cluster dashboard.
Click the Smart Alerts tab.
Figure 2. Kubernetes cluster Smart Alerts view
Note: This view shows all Smart Alerts configured for entities within the selected cluster.
Limitation: If two or more clusters share the same name, the Smart Alerts will apply to all those clusters. To target a specific cluster, you may need to adjust the filter to include additional identifying attributes such as zone, region, or other custom tags.
From a Kubernetes Namespace dashboard :
Navigate to a specific Kubernetes namespace dashboard.
Click the Smart Alerts tab.
Figure 3. Kubernetes namespace Smart Alerts view
Note: This view shows all Smart Alerts configured for entities within the selected namespace.
Adding a Kubernetes Smart Alert
You can create Kubernetes Smart Alerts from different contexts in the Instana UI. When you create alerts from cluster or namespace dashboards, the alert scope is automatically pre-configured with appropriate filters to target the specific context, saving you time and ensuring accuracy.
When you create a Smart Alert from a cluster dashboard, the alert scope is automatically pre-configured with a filter for the specific cluster:
Navigate to a Kubernetes cluster dashboard.
Click the Smart Alerts tab.
Click Create Smart Alert.
The alert configuration dialog opens with the Filter section automatically populated with the following filters, which ensure the alert applies only to resources within the selected namespace in the specified cluster:
kubernetes.cluster.name equals <cluster-name>
Complete the remaining configuration for your alert.
Limitation: If multiple clusters share the same name, the alert will apply to all clusters with that name. To target a specific cluster, add additional filters such as zone, region, or custom tags to uniquely identify the cluster.
Creating from a Kubernetes Namespace dashboard:
When you create a Smart Alert from a namespace dashboard, the alert scope is automatically pre-configured with filters for both the cluster and namespace:
Navigate to a Kubernetes namespace dashboard.
Click the Smart Alerts tab.
Click Create Smart Alert.
The alert configuration dialog opens with the Filter section automatically populated with the following filters, which ensure the alert applies only to resources within the selected namespace in the specified cluster:
kubernetes.cluster.name equals <cluster-name>
And
kubernetes.namespace.name equals <namespace-name>
Complete the remaining configuration for your alert.
Note: There are some differences for configuring Kubernetes Smart Alerts:
The button to click for creating a Kuberenetes Smart Alerts (Platforms > Kubernetes > Smart Alerts) is on a different tab than for creating an infrastructure Smart Alert (Infrastructure > Smart Alerts )
The alert list on the Kubernetes Smart Alerts tab shows only Kubernetes-related alerts, while the infrasture Smart Alerts tab shows all infrastructure alerts.
When selecting the entity type while configuring the alert scope, only Kubernetes entities can be selected, while all infrastructure entities are available when configuring an infrastructure Smart Alert.
Best Practices: When you are configuring a Kubernetes-specific Smart Alert, consider the following best practices:
Use per-entity alerting for critical components. For critical Kubernetes components such as API Server or etcd, use per-entity alerting to receive individual alerts for each instance.
Leverage custom aggregation for workloads. For application workloads such as pods and deployments, use custom aggregation grouped by namespace or deployment to reduce alert noise while maintaining visibility.
Enable forecast alerting for storage. Use forecast alerting for PersistentVolume metrics to proactively address storage capacity issues before they impact applications.
Group by namespace. When you monitor cluster-wide metrics, group by namespace to understand which teams or applications are affected.
Set appropriate time thresholds. Kubernetes environments can be dynamic with frequent pod restarts, scaling activities, and rolling updates. While Instana suggests thresholds based on historical data and metric patterns, review and adjust the time threshold settings to account for your cluster's normal operational patterns. This helps avoid false positives from transient issues that are part of normal Kubernetes operations.
Entity type selection
When you create a Kubernetes Smart Alert, the Entity type dropdown displays only Kubernetes-related entity types. This filtered list helps you quickly find and select the appropriate Kubernetes component you want to monitor. The following Kubernetes entity types are supported:
Core workload entities:
Cluster
Node
Namespace
Pod
Deployment
ReplicaSet
ReplicationController
DaemonSet
Endpoints
Storage:
PersistentVolume
PersistentVolumeClaim
Control plane components:
API Server
Controller Manager
Scheduler
etcd
Extensibility:
Custom Resource Definition
Kubernetes GPT
OpenShift:
OpenShift Deployment Config
GitOps (ArgoCD):
ArgoCD
ArgoCD Application
Cost monitoring:
KubeCost Platform
Figure 5. Kubernetes entity type selection
Terraform support
Kubernetes Smart Alerts can be managed programmatically by using the same Terraform resource as infrastructure Smart Alerts. When you create alerts for Kubernetes entity types, the alerts automatically appear in the Kubernetes Smart Alerts view. For more information about managing Smart Alerts by using Terraform, see the Instana infrastructure alert configuration documentation.
