Difference between Namespace and Context in K8s

Compare two totally different concept in K8s

Namespace and context are two totally different concepts in Kubernetes. Sometimes, we confuse them or think they are very related.

Namespace is a K8s API object or resource that uses to group and isolate resources in a Kubernetes cluster for different group of users.

On the other hand:

Context is a concept outside of the Kubernetes resources and runtime components! It is a concept in Kubectl client that enables us to work with more than one K8s cluster at a time.

Namespace vs. Context

We can consider the context as connection information and the namespace as a group of resources.

One important relation between namespace and context is that each context needs to have a default namespace.

We can set the default namespace for a context with this command:

kubectl config set-context cluster-prod --namespace=bar

To select a namespace on which the kubectl command should run, we need to use the “--namespace” or “-n” parameter, otherwise, the default namespace will be used.

To change the current context, we need to use this command:

kubectl config use-context cluster-test

To create a new namespace using the kubectl imperatively with this command:

kubectl create namespace foo

Or declaratively using a manifest resource file.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Namespace
metadata:
  name: foo   ## name of the namespace

To create a new context using the kubectl command, we can use the “kubectl config set-context“ command with different options or edit the kubectl config file (the default config file is in this path “~/.kube/config” or set by the “KUBECONFIG” environment variable)

To get the list of all available namespaces, we can use this command:

kubectl get namespaces

To get the list of all available context, we can use this command:

kubectl config get-contexts

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