Installing the Kairos Operator

Helm (recommended)

The operator publishes a Helm chart on each release via GitHub Pages and the GHCR OCI registry.

From the Helm repository

helm repo add kairos-operator https://kairos-io.github.io/kairos-operator/charts
helm repo update
helm install kairos-operator kairos-operator/kairos-operator \
  --namespace kairos-operator --create-namespace

From the OCI registry

helm install kairos-operator \
  oci://ghcr.io/kairos-io/helm-charts/kairos-operator \
  --version 0.1.0 \
  --namespace kairos-operator --create-namespace

Key values

Value	Default	Description
image.operator.tag	Chart appVersion	Operator image tag
image.nodeLabeler.tag	Chart appVersion	Node-labeler image tag
leaderElect	true	Disable for single-replica dev installs
toolImage	(built-in)	Override auroraboot image — useful for air-gapped environments
buildahImage	(built-in)	Override buildah image — useful for air-gapped environments
sentinelImage	(built-in)	Image for the reboot sentinel container (NodeOp rebootOnSuccess flow). Only needs sh + tee; defaults to NodeOp.spec.image, then busybox:latest. Override for air-gapped environments.
nodeops.defaultImage	busybox:latest	Fallback image for NodeOp Jobs
tolerations	control-plane + etcd	Scheduling tolerations for the operator Deployment

helm install kairos-operator kairos-operator/kairos-operator \
  --namespace kairos-operator --create-namespace \
  --set leaderElect=false \
  --set toolImage=my-registry.example.com/auroraboot:v0.24.0 \
  --set sentinelImage=my-registry.example.com/busybox:latest

Upgrading

helm repo update
helm upgrade kairos-operator kairos-operator/kairos-operator \
  --namespace kairos-operator --reuse-values

note

CRDs are placed in the crds/ directory of the chart. Helm installs them on first install but never upgrades or deletes them on helm upgrade or helm uninstall. To upgrade CRDs, apply them manually:

kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-operator/releases/latest/download/install.yaml

Removing

helm uninstall kairos-operator --namespace kairos-operator

CRDs survive uninstall by design. To remove them completely:

kubectl delete crd \
  osartifacts.build.kairos.io \
  nodeops.operator.kairos.io \
  nodeopupgrades.operator.kairos.io

---

Kustomize / plain kubectl

Each release publishes a pre-built install.yaml as a GitHub Release asset:

# Latest release
kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-operator/releases/latest/download/install.yaml

# Pin to a specific version
kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-operator/releases/download/v0.1.0/install.yaml

Alternatively, render from source using Kustomize directly (requires git):

kubectl apply -k https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-operator/config/default

When the operator starts, it will automatically detect Kairos nodes and label them with kairos.io/managed: true. This label can be used to target Kairos nodes specifically in hybrid clusters.

Removing

kubectl delete -f https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-operator/releases/latest/download/install.yaml

---

Installing via Bundle

You can also install the Kairos Operator using a bundle by adding the following configuration to your cloud-config file:

bundles:
  - targets:
      - run://quay.io/kairos/community-bundles:kairos-operator_latest

This will automatically deploy the operator during the node initialization process.

Removing the Bundle Installation

To remove the operator installed via bundle, delete the kairos-operator.yaml file from the appropriate location:

• k0s: /var/lib/k0s/manifests/kairos-operator/
• k3s: /var/lib/rancher/k3s/server/manifests/

Next step

The operator handles reconciliation of custom resources but does not provide a web UI. If you want a browser-accessible dashboard for kicking off builds, enrolling nodes, and driving fleet operations, see Installing AuroraBoot alongside the operator to deploy the AuroraBoot web UI into the same cluster.