Free Online Course · Self-paced

Kubernetes Tutorial for Beginners & Experienced

Free Kubernetes tutorial that takes you from cluster install to CKA/CKAD-level topics - pods, deployments, RBAC, networking, Helm, security, autoscaling. 50+ hands-on lessons across 13 chapters, every example tested on real multi-node clusters.

  • 55 parts
  • ~621 min total
  • Beginner to Advanced
  • Updated May 2026
Start the course View syllabus
Kubernetes Tutorial for Beginners & Experienced
By Last updated

This Kubernetes tutorial takes you from Beginner to Pro with 50+ hands-on lessons covering both the CKAD and CKA exam syllabi. Every chapter is written so you can run the YAML against a real cluster - either a local Minikube/kind setup or a multi-node cluster on AWS - and every command output is from a working environment.

Start with Chapter 1 if this is your first time with Kubernetes - we will get a cluster running before introducing pods, deployments and the rest of the workload primitives. If you already know the basics, jump to any chapter below; each lesson is self-contained but the order is designed to build on the previous topic.

Click Start the course to begin with Minikube, or use the syllabus to skip directly to what you need.

What you'll learn

  • Install single-node and multi-node Kubernetes clusters on Minikube, kubeadm and AWS EC2
  • Master core workload primitives - Pods, Deployments, ReplicaSets, StatefulSets, DaemonSets, Jobs
  • Configure storage, ConfigMaps, Secrets and projected volumes the right way
  • Lock down clusters with RBAC, Pod Security, Network Policies and SecurityContext
  • Package and ship apps with Helm charts, hooks and named templates
  • Operate a cluster - upgrades, autoscaling, health checks, monitoring and OOM debugging

Prerequisites

  • Comfortable with Linux command line and basic networking concepts
  • Familiarity with containers (Docker basics - run, build, image, registry)
  • A workstation that can run a multi-node cluster (8 GB RAM minimum, 16 GB recommended) or an AWS/GCP free-tier account
  • Basic YAML knowledge (you will be writing a lot of YAML)

Syllabus

13 chapters · 55 lessons · ~621 min of reading

  1. 1 Setup Kubernetes Cluster 7 lessons
    1. Part 1 Install single-node cluster with Minikube 6 min read
    2. Part 2 Install multi-node cluster with kubeadm (Weave Net CNI) 26 min read
    3. Part 3 Install multi-node cluster on Ubuntu (Calico CNI) 10 min read
    4. Part 4 Multi-node cluster on Rocky Linux (Containerd) 10 min read
    5. Part 5 Install Kubernetes cluster on AWS EC2 27 min read
    6. Part 6 Deploy an EKS cluster with Terraform 15 min read
    7. Part 7 Check the Kubernetes cluster version 7 min read
  2. 2 Getting Started with Kubernetes 9 lessons
    1. Part 8 Kubernetes architecture overview 10 min read
    2. Part 9 Kubernetes namespaces 9 min read
    3. Part 10 Kubernetes pods 15 min read
    4. Part 11 Deployments and rolling updates 14 min read
    5. Part 12 ReplicaSet and ReplicationController 14 min read
    6. Part 13 Kubernetes StatefulSets 10 min read
    7. Part 14 Kubernetes DaemonSets 9 min read
    8. Part 15 Autoscaling pods (HPA / VPA) 10 min read
    9. Part 16 Kubernetes API server explained 12 min read
  3. 3 Multi-Container Pods 2 lessons
    1. Part 17 Init containers 4 min read
    2. Part 18 Sidecar and multi-container pod pattern 16 min read
  4. 4 Jobs and Cron Jobs 1 lesson
    1. Part 19 Kubernetes CronJob scheduler 6 min read
  5. 5 Volumes 2 lessons
    1. Part 20 Kubernetes volumes overview 13 min read
    2. Part 21 Persistent volumes and PVCs 16 min read
  6. 6 ConfigMaps and Secrets 5 lessons
    1. Part 22 Kubernetes ConfigMaps 11 min read
    2. Part 23 Kubernetes Secrets 11 min read
    3. Part 24 mountPath vs subPath 6 min read
    4. Part 25 Projected volumes (multiple secrets, one dir) 6 min read
    5. Part 26 Update ConfigMaps & Secrets without pod restart 6 min read
  7. 7 Securing Kubernetes 8 lessons
    1. Part 27 Securing a Kubernetes cluster 13 min read
    2. Part 28 SecurityContext explained 17 min read
    3. Part 29 SecurityContext capabilities 10 min read
    4. Part 30 Create a privileged pod (and why not to) 14 min read
    5. Part 31 Pod Security Policy / Pod Security Standards 11 min read
    6. Part 32 Authentication & authorization 7 min read
    7. Part 33 ServiceAccounts 10 min read
    8. Part 34 Kubernetes RBAC 13 min read
  8. 8 Resources and Scheduling 5 lessons
    1. Part 35 Pod resource requests and limits 7 min read
    2. Part 36 Monitor pod and container resource usage 9 min read
    3. Part 37 Namespace ResourceQuota 13 min read
    4. Part 38 PodDisruptionBudget 7 min read
    5. Part 39 Node affinity and anti-affinity 7 min read
  9. 9 Networking and Services 4 lessons
    1. Part 40 Kubernetes networking model 34 min read
    2. Part 41 Services - ClusterIP, NodePort, LoadBalancer 12 min read
    3. Part 42 Expose services with Ingress 9 min read
    4. Part 43 kubectl port-forward 7 min read
  10. 10 Labels and Selectors 3 lessons
    1. Part 44 Labels, selectors and annotations 10 min read
    2. Part 45 Add labels to nodes 5 min read
    3. Part 46 Add labels to running pods 6 min read
  11. 11 Working with Helm Charts 4 lessons
    1. Part 47 Helm charts introduction 14 min read
    2. Part 48 Helm named templates 15 min read
    3. Part 49 Helm hooks with examples 14 min read
    4. Part 50 Helm hook weight and ordering 7 min read
  12. 12 Probes and Health Checks 1 lesson
    1. Part 51 Liveness and readiness probes 15 min read
  13. 13 Operations and Maintenance 4 lessons
    1. Part 52 Upgrade a Kubernetes cluster 12 min read
    2. Part 53 Add nodes to an existing cluster 8 min read
    3. Part 54 Remove nodes from a cluster 6 min read
    4. Part 55 Debug OOMKilled (exit code 137) 10 min read
Deepak Prasad

R&D Engineer

Founder of GoLinuxCloud with over a decade of expertise in Linux, Python, Go, Laravel, DevOps, Kubernetes, Git, Shell scripting, OpenShift, AWS, Networking, and Security. With extensive experience, he excels across development, DevOps, …

Certifications
  • Red Hat Certified System Administrator in Red Hat OpenStack
  • Certified Kubernetes Application Developer (CKAD)
  • Red Hat Certified Specialist in Ansible Automation
Expertise
  • Go (programming language)
  • Python (programming language)
  • DevOps
  • Computer Security