Pod Status Check

Pod Status Check is a built-in Command Probe template that validates the current state of Kubernetes pods during a chaos experiment. It confirms that the targeted pods reach the expected Running state, which makes it one of the most fundamental checks for application availability. You select pods by label, by name, or by the owning workload kind and namespace.

The probe runs the healthchecks utility bundled in the chaos probe image, queries the Kubernetes API, and prints [Pass] when every targeted pod is healthy. The comparator marks the probe as passed when the output contains [Pass].

BUILT-IN PROBE TEMPLATE

This is a built-in Command Probe template that runs on Kubernetes chaos infrastructure. Add it to an experiment from the probe library and customize its inputs. Go to Built-in probe templates to browse the full library, or go to Command probe to understand how command probes work.

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Use cases

Use this probe template to:

• Verify that pods stay in the Running state during chaos experiments.

• Validate pod health after failures and restarts.

• Monitor application availability continuously.

• Confirm that pods recover to a healthy state after disruptions.

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How the probe works

The template configures a Command Probe that runs healthchecks -name pod-level. The utility resolves the target pods from TARGET_LABELS, TARGET_NAMES, TARGET_KIND, and TARGET_NAMESPACE, queries the Kubernetes API, and prints [Pass] when every resolved pod is in a healthy Running state. The comparator passes the probe when the output contains [Pass], and fails it otherwise.

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Prerequisites

• Chaos infrastructure: A Kubernetes chaos infrastructure installed in the target cluster.

• Namespace access: Access to the target namespace and pods.

• RBAC permissions: Permissions for the chaos service account to query pod status.

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Probe properties

Command

healthchecks -name pod-level

Comparator

Type	Criteria	Value
string	contains	[Pass]

The probe passes when the command output contains [Pass], which indicates that every targeted pod is in a healthy Running state.

Environment variables

Variable	Description	Required	Default
TARGET_LABELS	Comma-separated list of labels used to filter pods (for example, app=nginx,tier=frontend).	No	-
TARGET_NAMES	Comma-separated list of target pod names.	No	-
TARGET_NAMESPACE	Namespace of the target pods.	Yes	-
TARGET_KIND	Kind of the owning workload (for example, deployment, statefulset, daemonset).	No	deployment
STATUS_CHECK_TIMEOUT	Maximum time in seconds to wait for the status check.	No	180
STATUS_CHECK_DELAY	Delay in seconds between status checks.	No	2

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Run properties

Property	Description	Type	Default
timeout	Maximum time to wait for the probe to complete (for example, 30s, 1m, 5m).	String	180s
interval	Time between probe executions (for example, 1s, 5s, 10s).	String	1s
attempt	Number of retry attempts before the probe is marked as failed.	Integer	1
pollingInterval	Time between retry attempts (for example, 1s, 5s, 10s).	String	-
initialDelay	Initial delay before the probe starts (for example, 0s, 10s, 30s).	String	-
stopOnFailure	Stop the experiment if the probe fails.	Boolean	false
verbosity	Log verbosity level (info, debug, trace).	String	-

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Troubleshooting

Pod Status Check probe fails because no pods matched the target

The selectors did not resolve any pods. Confirm that TARGET_LABELS, TARGET_NAMES, and TARGET_NAMESPACE match running pods, and that TARGET_KIND matches the owning workload. An empty match is treated as a failure.

Pod Status Check probe fails with a forbidden or RBAC error

The chaos service account does not have permission to read pods in the target namespace. Grant get and list on pods for the chaos service account in that namespace, then rerun the experiment.

Pod Status Check probe times out before pods reach Running

The pods did not reach a healthy Running state within STATUS_CHECK_TIMEOUT. Increase STATUS_CHECK_TIMEOUT and the run-property timeout, and inspect the pods with kubectl describe pod to find pending, crash-loop, or image-pull issues.

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Related probe templates

• Container Restart Check: Validate that container restart counts stay within a threshold.

• Pod Replica Count Check: Validate that a workload keeps its minimum healthy replicas.

• Built-in probe templates: Browse the full probe template library.