Skip to content

Quick Start

This guide will help you quickly launch a cluster with default options.

New to Kubernetes? The official Kubernetes docs already have some great tutorials outlining the basics here.

Prerequisites

Make sure your environment fulfills the requirements. If NetworkManager is installed and enabled on your hosts, ensure that it is configured to ignore CNI-managed interfaces.

Server Node Installation

RKE2 provides an installation script that is a convenient way to install it as a service on systemd based systems. This script is available at https://get.rke2.io. To install RKE2 using this method do the following:

1. Run the installer

curl -sfL https://get.rke2.io | sh -
This will install the rke2-server service and the rke2 binary onto your machine.

2. Enable the rke2-server service

systemctl enable rke2-server.service

3. Start the service

systemctl start rke2-server.service

4. Follow the logs, if you like

journalctl -u rke2-server -f

After running this installation:

  • The rke2-server service will be installed. The rke2-server service will be configured to automatically restart after node reboots or if the process crashes or is killed.
  • Additional utilities will be installed at /var/lib/rancher/rke2/bin/. They include: kubectl, crictl, and ctr. Note that these are not on your path by default.
  • Two cleanup scripts will be installed to the path at /usr/local/bin/rke2. They are: rke2-killall.sh and rke2-uninstall.sh.
  • A kubeconfig file will be written to /etc/rancher/rke2/rke2.yaml.
  • A token that can be used to register other server or agent nodes will be created at /var/lib/rancher/rke2/server/node-token

Note: If you are adding additional server nodes, you must have an odd number in total. An odd number is needed to maintain quorum. See the High Availability documentation for more details.

Agent (Worker) Node Installation

1. Run the installer

curl -sfL https://get.rke2.io | INSTALL_RKE2_TYPE="agent" sh -
This will install the rke2-agent service and the rke2 binary onto your machine.

2. Enable the rke2-agent service

systemctl enable rke2-agent.service

3. Configure the rke2-agent service

mkdir -p /etc/rancher/rke2/
vim /etc/rancher/rke2/config.yaml
Content for config.yaml: 
server: https://<server>:9345
token: <token from server node>
Note: The rke2 server process listens on port 9345 for new nodes to register. The Kubernetes API is still served on port 6443, as normal.

4. Start the service

systemctl start rke2-agent.service

Follow the logs, if you like 

journalctl -u rke2-agent -f

Note: Each machine must have a unique hostname. If your machines do not have unique hostnames, set the node-name parameter in the config.yaml file and provide a value with a valid and unique hostname for each node.

To read more about the config.yaml file, see the Install Options documentation.