KubeletTooManyPods

Meaning

The alert fires when a specific node is running >95% of its capacity of pods (110 by default).

Full context

Kubelets have a configuration that limits how many Pods they can run. The default value of this is 110 Pods per Kubelet, but it is configurable (and this alert takes that configuration into account with the `kube_node_status_capacity_pods` metric).

Impact

Running many pods (more than 110) on a single node places a strain on the Container Runtime Interface (CRI), Container Network Interface (CNI), and the operating system itself. Approaching that limit may affect performance and availability of that node.

Diagnosis

Check the number of pods on a given node by running:

kubectl get pods --all-namespaces --field-selector spec.nodeName=<node>

Mitigation

Since Kubernetes only officially supports 110 pods per node, you should preferably move pods onto other nodes or expand your cluster with more worker nodes.

If you're certain the node can handle more pods, you can raise the max pods per node limit by changing maxPods in your KubeletConfiguration (for kubeadm-based clusters) or changing the setting in your cloud provider's dashboard (if supported).