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Install

Install kubectl on Linux

Install kubectl on a Linux machine. Choose the method that fits your distribution; verification steps are included for the curl path.

Native package manager (Debian / Ubuntu)

Recommended on Debian-family distributions for automatic security updates.

  1. 1. Install
    bash
    sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl gnupg
curl -fsSL https://pkgs.k8s.io/core:/stable:/v1.32/deb/Release.key | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/kubernetes-apt-keyring.gpg
echo 'deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/kubernetes-apt-keyring.gpg] https://pkgs.k8s.io/core:/stable:/v1.32/deb/ /' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kubernetes.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y kubectl
Verify install
bash
kubectl version --client

Native package manager (RHEL / Fedora / CentOS Stream)

  1. 1. Install
    install-kubectl.sh
    cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/kubernetes.repo
[kubernetes]
name=Kubernetes
baseurl=https://pkgs.k8s.io/core:/stable:/v1.32/rpm/
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://pkgs.k8s.io/core:/stable:/v1.32/rpm/repodata/repomd.xml.key
EOF
sudo dnf install -y kubectl

Direct binary (curl)

Use this when you need a specific version or your distro is not supported.

  1. 1. Download
    bash
    curl -LO "https://dl.k8s.io/release/v1.36.1/bin/linux/amd64/kubectl"
  2. 2. Verify checksum
    bash
    curl -LO "https://dl.k8s.io/v1.36.1/bin/linux/amd64/kubectl.sha256"
echo "$(cat kubectl.sha256)  kubectl" | sha256sum --check
  3. 3. Install
    bash
    sudo install -o root -g root -m 0755 kubectl /usr/local/bin/kubectl
Verify install
bash
kubectl version --client

Snap

  1. 1. Install
    bash
    sudo snap install kubectl --classic