Kube Lens: The Visual IDE for Kubernetes

Kube Lens is a desktop Kubernetes IDE that gives you a single, visual control plane for clusters, resources, logs and metrics—so you spend less time wrestling with kubectl output and more time solving real problems. In this post I’ll walk through installing Lens, adding clusters, and the everyday workflows I actually use, the features that speed up debugging, and practical tips to get teams onboarded safely.

Prerequisites

A valid kubeconfig (~/.kube/config) with the cluster contexts you need (or point Lens at alternate kubeconfig files).

What is Lens (Lens IDE / Kube Lens)

Lens is a cross-platform desktop application that connects to one or many Kubernetes clusters and presents a curated, interactive UI for exploring workloads, nodes, pods, services, and configuration. Think of it as your cluster’s cockpit—visual, searchable, and stateful—without losing the ability to run kubectl commands when you need them.

Kube Lens features

Kube ...