Kubernetes for Windows: A Complete Setup Guide

Running separate orchestration systems for Linux and Windows adds unnecessary complexity—different toolchains, duplicated security policies, and fragmented monitoring. Kubernetes for Windows eliminates this divide by bringing both workloads under one control plane. With this setup, platform teams can apply consistent GitOps workflows, kubectl commands, and Helm charts across their entire stack.

But unifying platforms isn’t just a matter of adding Windows nodes. It requires careful attention to Windows-specific networking, configuration, and compatibility constraints. This guide is built for platform engineers and covers the complete setup: from local development and CNI configuration to debugging common issues—giving you a reliable path to managing hybrid Kubernetes clusters at scale.

Key takeaways:

• Unify your infrastructure with a hybrid cluster: Integrate Windows worker nodes into your existing Kubernetes environment to manage legacy .NET applications alongside Linux workloads, all using the same declarative tools and workflows.
• Account for Windows-specific configurations: Recognize that Windows nodes have unique requirements. Plan for compatible CNI plugins for networking, Windows-specific CSI drivers for storage, and be aware of feature limitations compared to Linux to avoid deployment failures.
• Standardize management for fleet-wide stability: Enforce best practices like RBAC for security, proper resource allocation for performance, and node selectors for correct pod placement. Using a unified platform helps apply these standards consistently across your entire hybrid fleet.

Kubernetes supports Windows workloads by enabling Windows Server nodes to join Linux-based clusters as worker nodes. While the control plane always runs on Linux, Windows nodes can host Windows containers, giving you a unified orchestration layer across platforms. This hybrid setup is essential for teams looking to modernize legacy Windows applications without rewriting them from scratch.

How Kubernetes Works on Windows

In a typical setup:

• Control plane runs on Linux: The API server, scheduler, and controller manager live on Linux-based nodes.
• Windows nodes act as workers: These nodes run kubelet, kube-proxy, and a compatible container runtime (like containerd).
• Scheduling logic is OS-aware: When you deploy a Windows container, Kubernetes automatically schedules it on a Windows node using the nodeSelector or OS-specific taints and tolerations.

Tools like kubectl, Helm, and GitOps workflows work seamlessly, making Windows workloads first-class citizens in your Kubernetes ecosystem.

Why Use Kubernetes for Windows Workloads?

1. Modernize legacy applications: You can containerize .NET Framework or Windows-based apps without rewriting them for Linux.
2. Unify operations: One platform team, one CI/CD pipeline, one control plane—fewer silos.
3. Standardize lifecycle management: Apply the same Helm charts, RBAC, and monitoring tools across all workloads.

However, be aware of:

• Feature gaps: Some Kubernetes features (e.g., hostPath volumes, privileged containers, certain CNIs) may not be fully supported on Windows. See Kubernetes Windows feature parity.
• Heavier resource usage: Windows containers require more memory, CPU, and disk, so plan your capacity accordingly.
• Compatibility requirements: Ensure your Windows nodes are running supported versions.

Set Up Kubernetes on Windows

Getting a local Kubernetes environment running on Windows is the first step toward developing and testing your containerized applications. The process is straightforward if you follow a few key steps, from verifying your system to choosing the right installation tool for your needs.

Verify Your System Requirements

Before you begin the installation, confirm your system meets the necessary specifications. Windows containers have a larger resource footprint than their Linux counterparts, so a standard developer laptop might need a resource check. For a stable environment, your machine should have at least:

• 4 CPU cores
• 8 GB of RAM
• 50 GB of available disk space

Meeting these minimums prevents performance bottlenecks during development and testing. Under-resourced systems can lead to slow builds, pod scheduling failures, and an overall frustrating experience. Verifying your hardware upfront ensures a smoother setup process and a more reliable local cluster for your development workflows.

Choose Your Installation Method: Docker Desktop, Minikube, or Kind

You have several solid options for installing Kubernetes locally on Windows:

• Docker Desktop: The most direct path, which includes Kubernetes as an optional feature. It supports both Hyper-V and WSL 2, though WSL 2 is generally preferred for its speed and lighter footprint.
• Minikube: A straightforward option for beginners, Minikube runs a local Kubernetes cluster in a VM or container and works well for basic testing.
• Kind (Kubernetes in Docker): Better suited for more advanced testing, including multi-node scenarios or CI pipelines.

Your choice depends on your specific use case and familiarity with the ecosystem. Each tool has a slightly different installation experience, so refer to their documentation for the most up-to-date instructions.

Follow a Step-by-Step Setup Guide

Here’s how to get started using Docker Desktop with WSL 2:

Confirm Windows Version
Ensure you're running Windows 10 or 11 with support for WSL 2.

Install a Package Manager
Use Chocolatey to simplify command-line installation:

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; `
[System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor 3072; `
iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://community.chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))

Install Docker Desktop
Run:

choco install docker-desktop

Restart your machine after installation. Ensure virtualization (VT-x or AMD-V) is enabled in your BIOS.

Enable Kubernetes
Open Docker Desktop > Settings > Kubernetes and enable Kubernetes. Docker will download and configure the necessary images.

Verify the Installation
Open a terminal and run:

kubectl get nodes

You should see a single node named docker-desktop with a Ready status. This confirms your Kubernetes cluster is operational.

Configure and Manage Your Windows Kubernetes Cluster

Once your Windows Kubernetes cluster is running, your focus shifts from setup to ongoing management. This involves interacting with the cluster to deploy, update, and monitor your applications. The primary tasks revolve around using the command-line interface, creating application workloads, and leveraging package managers to streamline deployments.

While these tools are powerful, managing them at scale—especially across hybrid environments with both Windows and Linux nodes—introduces significant operational complexity. This is where a unified management platform becomes essential.

Plural provides a single pane of glass for your entire Kubernetes fleet, abstracting away the low-level complexities of direct cluster management. Instead of juggling multiple kubeconfig files and command-line tools for different clusters, you can use Plural’s secure, SSO-integrated dashboard for ad-hoc troubleshooting and visibility. Its GitOps-based continuous deployment engine ensures that your application configurations are consistently applied across all clusters, whether they run on Windows or Linux. This reduces the chance of configuration drift and allows your team to manage a diverse infrastructure with a consistent, declarative workflow.

Set Up kubectl for Basic Operations

kubectl is the official command-line tool for communicating with the Kubernetes API server. It allows you to run commands to deploy applications, inspect resources, and view logs.

To get started:

• Install kubectl on your Windows machine. Ensure the version is within one minor release of your Kubernetes cluster version to avoid compatibility issues.
• Verify installation by running:

kubectl version --client

While kubectl is indispensable, Plural’s embedded Kubernetes dashboard offers a powerful UI-based alternative. It integrates with your identity provider via OIDC for seamless SSO, giving you secure, role-based access to your clusters, without the hassle of managing local kubeconfigs.

Create and Manage Pods and Deployments

Kubernetes allows you to orchestrate both Windows and Linux workloads within the same cluster. To run a Windows application:

1. Package it into a Windows container.
2. Deploy it as a Pod, which is the smallest deployable unit in Kubernetes.

However, note that Windows containers have some limitations. For example, they don’t support privileged containers, and DaemonSets or host networking are not available.

To ensure scalability and resiliency, use a Deployment—a higher-level resource that manages Pods and ReplicaSets. With Plural CD, you can define Deployments as YAML manifests stored in Git, and the platform will automatically synchronize them to your clusters. This enables a consistent, hands-off approach to managing application lifecycles across environments.

Manage Applications with Helm Charts

As applications grow in complexity, manually managing their resources becomes inefficient. Helm simplifies this by bundling all necessary Kubernetes objects—Deployments, Services, ConfigMaps—into a reusable package called a Chart.

Using Helm, you can:

• Install applications with a single command.
• Upgrade configurations safely.
• Roll back releases in case of failures.

Plural CD natively integrates with Helm, allowing you to declaratively manage Helm releases across your entire infrastructure. By storing Helm values and release configurations in Git, you can automate deployments to both Windows and Linux clusters at scale, ensuring consistency, traceability, and control.

Key Differences for Kubernetes on Windows

While Kubernetes provides a unified orchestration layer, running workloads on Windows nodes introduces specific considerations that differ from standard Linux environments. These differences span container support, networking, and storage—and understanding them is essential for successfully deploying and managing a hybrid cluster.

Ignoring these distinctions can lead to deployment failures, performance issues, and security gaps. A successful implementation requires a deliberate approach that accounts for the unique architecture of Windows containers and how they integrate with the broader Kubernetes ecosystem.

Understand Windows Container Support and Limitations

Kubernetes enables both Windows and Linux workloads to run in the same cluster, offering flexibility for organizations with diverse technology stacks. However, Windows containers come with notable limitations:

• Privileged containers are not supported.
• Pod security contexts and SELinux capabilities are unavailable.
• Features like DaemonSets, host networking, and init containers behave differently or may not work at all.

These restrictions affect how you structure and secure your workloads. Before deploying, review the official Windows support documentation to ensure your use cases are compatible.

Platforms like Plural help abstract these OS-level differences. By offering a consistent, declarative deployment workflow, Plural enables you to manage hybrid environments (Linux + Windows) without having to micromanage low-level OS-specific details.

Configure Networking for Windows Nodes

Networking is one of the most critical differences between Windows and Linux in Kubernetes. Windows uses a distinct networking stack, and not all CNI (Container Network Interface) plugins that work with Linux nodes are supported on Windows.

Key considerations include:

• Host networking is not available on Windows.
• NetworkPolicy enforcement is limited or requires specific CNIs.
• CNIs like Azure CNI are often necessary for Windows support in managed services like AKS.

To ensure reliable pod-to-pod and pod-to-service communication, you’ll need to validate that your selected CNI plugin fully supports Windows. Microsoft provides a useful Kubernetes networking guide for Windows to help you plan and configure networking in hybrid clusters.

Choose Storage Options for Windows Nodes

Storage management on Windows requires additional planning. Compared to Linux containers, Windows container images are larger and consume more system resources (CPU, memory, disk). While Kubernetes supports PersistentVolumes (PVs) and PersistentVolumeClaims (PVCs) on Windows, implementation details differ.

Important notes:

• Use CSI drivers compatible with Windows and NTFS-formatted volumes.
• The deprecation of in-tree volume plugins makes proper CSI driver selection even more crucial.
• File system behaviors and performance characteristics differ from ext4/XFS, affecting how stateful workloads behave.

Tools like Plural can simplify resource management by providing a unified, GitOps-based interface to define and roll out infrastructure-as-code—including storage configurations—across both Windows and Linux nodes.

Apply Best Practices for Kubernetes on Windows

Running Kubernetes on Windows introduces OS-specific considerations that differ from a purely Linux-based environment. Applying best practices for security, performance, and workload management is essential to ensure a stable, efficient, and secure hybrid cluster.

While the foundational principles of Kubernetes remain the same, paying attention to Windows-specific nuances helps you avoid common pitfalls and build a resilient infrastructure. The following best practices will help you secure your cluster, optimize resource usage, and manage mixed-OS workloads effectively.

Secure Your Cluster with RBAC

Implementing Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) is critical to protect your Kubernetes clusters. RBAC enables you to define who can access what and what actions they can perform. On Windows clusters, the requirements are the same—ensure only authorized users and services can interact with workloads and node resources.

Plural streamlines RBAC management by integrating with your OIDC identity provider, such as Okta, Azure AD, or Google Workspace. This lets you enforce access policies based on user identity or group membership. Through Kubernetes impersonation, you can grant granular permissions with native ClusterRoleBinding resources, linked directly to a user’s email address. The result is a secure, SSO-enabled experience for accessing and managing your Kubernetes resources—all from a single UI.

Optimize Cluster Performance

Windows containers typically consume more CPU, memory, and storage than Linux containers. To avoid node pressure and ensure stable operation:

• Provision Windows nodes with a minimum of 4 CPU cores, 8GB of RAM, and 50GB of available disk.
• Monitor for resource overcommitment and configure appropriate requests and limits in your deployments.
• Schedule resource-intensive workloads thoughtfully to prevent pod evictions.

Plural’s centralized observability dashboard allows you to monitor real-time resource utilization—CPU, memory, disk—across your entire hybrid fleet. With this single-pane-of-glass view, platform teams can proactively detect under-provisioned nodes, optimize workloads, and prevent bottlenecks before they cause production issues.

Manage Hybrid Linux-Windows Clusters

Kubernetes supports mixed-OS workloads, enabling Linux and Windows applications to run within the same cluster. This simplifies operations and reduces overhead by eliminating the need for separate orchestration systems. However, effective scheduling and workload separation are key.

Follow these practices:

• Use node selectors in your pod specs to target Windows nodes:

nodeSelector:
  kubernetes.io/os: windows

• Apply taints and tolerations to prevent Linux pods from being scheduled on Windows nodes and vice versa.
• Separate sensitive workloads using node affinity.

Plural’s GitOps-driven CD engine makes managing these hybrid deployments easier. By storing your manifests in Git with the proper node selectors and policies, Plural ensures Windows workloads consistently land on Windows nodes, and Linux workloads stay isolated, all while keeping deployments declarative and traceable across your entire fleet.

Troubleshoot Common Kubernetes Issues on Windows

Even with a properly configured cluster, issues are inevitable. While the fundamental problems—such as misconfigurations, permission denials, and resource shortages—are common across all Kubernetes environments, Windows introduces additional challenges. Understanding these nuances is critical for efficient troubleshooting.

Plural’s unified dashboard provides observability across your fleet, reducing the time spent debugging clusters with varying architectures and configurations. Whether you're dealing with container image errors or resource bottlenecks, centralized visibility accelerates root cause analysis and remediation.

Fix Image Pull Failures and Config Errors

One of the most common and frustrating errors in Kubernetes is ImagePullBackOff or ErrImagePull. These typically mean Kubernetes is unable to retrieve the specified image from a container registry. Common causes include:

• Typos in image name or tag
• Incorrect registry URLs
• Missing or misconfigured imagePullSecrets
• Private registries requiring authentication
• Network access issues on the Windows node

How to debug:

1. Run kubectl describe pod <pod-name> and review the Events section for error messages.
2. Verify the image path, tag, and registry accessibility from the node.
3. For private registries, confirm that imagePullSecrets are properly defined and referenced in your pod spec.
4. If using a self-hosted registry, check the Windows firewall or proxy settings that might block access.

Pro tip: Windows images often require exact version tags. Avoid using :latest in production environments.

Resolve Permission Issues and API Failures

Unexpected access denials often point to misconfigured Role-Based Access Control (RBAC). These issues typically appear when:

• A Pod’s service account lacks the necessary permissions to access resources
• RBAC roles are not applied to the correct namespace or subject
• Cloud nodes lack the proper IAM permissions to interact with managed services (e.g., pulling from Azure Container Registry or ECR)

How to debug:

1. Use kubectl auth can-i <verb> <resource> --as=system:serviceaccount:<namespace>:<serviceaccountname> to check permissions.
2. Confirm that your Role or ClusterRoleBinding is bound to the correct ServiceAccount.
3. On cloud platforms, validate that the node or VM instance has the required permissions (e.g., IAM roles on AWS or service principals on Azure).

With Plural, RBAC is managed declaratively and synced automatically across clusters. The SSO-integrated dashboard uses your organization’s OIDC identity, eliminating the need for local kubeconfig files and reducing the surface area for misconfigurations.

Address Resource Constraints and Scheduling Errors

Windows workloads can be significantly more demanding in terms of CPU, memory, and disk I/O. When Pods fail to start or remain in a Pending state, it’s often due to resource exhaustion or scheduling conflicts.

Common causes:

• Insufficient resources on the node
• Overprovisioned workloads without resource limits
• Architecture mismatches in hybrid clusters (e.g., trying to schedule a Linux container on a Windows node)

How to debug:

1. Run kubectl describe node <node-name> to inspect allocatable resources and usage.
2. Ensure your pod spec includes a node selector:

nodeSelector:
  kubernetes.io/os: windows

3. Check your workloads for appropriate CPU and memory requests/limits.
4. Use taints and tolerations to prevent scheduling mismatches between Windows and Linux pods.

Plural’s observability platform helps you monitor real-time resource usage across clusters, enabling proactive scaling, workload redistribution, and early detection of bottlenecks.

Monitor, Log, and Manage Resources

Operating a hybrid Kubernetes environment with both Linux and Windows nodes demands a robust observability strategy. Without it, you're likely to encounter undiagnosed performance issues, security blind spots, and unnecessary infrastructure costs. A well-integrated observability stack allows platform teams to shift from reactive troubleshooting to proactive optimization, ensuring the health, performance, and cost-efficiency of your clusters.

Implement Essential Monitoring Tools

Maintaining cluster health begins with reliable performance telemetry. The standard open-source observability stack includes:

• Prometheus for time-series metrics
• Grafana for visualization
• cAdvisor for container-level resource usage

These tools offer powerful insights, but deploying and managing them across multiple clusters—especially with both Windows and Linux nodes—adds operational complexity.

Plural abstracts that complexity. It integrates a full observability suite directly into the platform, giving you a single-pane-of-glass view across all clusters. With no need to set up and manage multiple telemetry systems, your team can focus on performance tuning instead of infrastructure wiring.

Develop an Effective Logging Strategy

When applications fail or security incidents occur, logs are your first line of defense. However, without centralized logging, tracking down the root cause—especially on Windows nodes—can be tedious and error-prone.

Popular logging stacks like ELK (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana) provide powerful log aggregation and querying, but require significant infrastructure and tuning.

Plural simplifies this with native log aggregation built into its observability platform. You can:

• Query logs from any Pod, namespace, or node (Linux or Windows)
• Visualize log trends across environments
• Debug issues faster without switching between clusters or CLI tools

This centralization ensures that logs are both accessible and actionable—critical for fast incident response and long-term auditability.

Optimize Resources for Windows Nodes

Resource usage patterns for Windows containers often differ from those on Linux—requiring more memory and CPU, and generating larger images. If left unmanaged, this leads to over-provisioning and budget overruns.

While commands like kubectl top or metrics exposed by kube-state-metrics provide point-in-time snapshots of resource usage, they offer limited insight into why resource issues occur.

Plural’s embedded observability tools go further:

• The Kubernetes dashboard gives real-time metrics across your hybrid fleet, accessible through a secure SSO-authenticated interface.
• The AI Insight Engine analyzes trends in resource consumption, identifying inefficiencies and suggesting actionable optimizations—for example:
  • Reducing CPU limits for underutilized services
  • Right-sizing Windows node pools based on historical usage
  • Highlighting pods with unstable memory behavior

This turns your observability system into a continuous improvement engine, helping teams deliver better performance with fewer resources.

Explore Advanced Kubernetes Topics on Windows

Once your Kubernetes cluster with Windows nodes is up and running, the next phase is optimization. This means going beyond basic workloads to integrate with cloud platforms, refine your containerization strategy, and stay aligned with the evolving Kubernetes ecosystem. These advanced topics will help you build scalable, maintainable infrastructure for Windows-based applications, especially in hybrid environments.

Integrate with Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)

If your organization already relies on Microsoft technologies, Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is a natural fit. AKS offers managed Kubernetes clusters with native support for Windows Server containers, simplifying many operational tasks like patching, scaling, and load balancing.

For teams managing infrastructure across clouds and on-premises, Plural integrates with AKS via Cluster API providers. This lets you:

• Provision and scale AKS clusters declaratively
• Manage AKS alongside EKS, GKE, and on-prem clusters from a single control plane
• Enforce consistent GitOps workflows across your hybrid fleet

This centralization allows platform teams to treat infrastructure as code, eliminating the need for bespoke tooling across environments.

Develop a Containerization Strategy for Windows Apps

Effectively deploying applications on Kubernetes starts with a sound containerization strategy. For Windows apps, this means building container images based on Windows Server base images—either Windows Server Core or Nano Server, depending on the app’s requirements.

Best practices include:

• Automating builds with tools like Dockerfiles or Packer
• Storing images in a secure, versioned container registry
• Using consistent CI/CD pipelines for reproducible builds

Plural’s GitOps engine ties these efforts together by syncing containerized apps directly from your Git repositories to your clusters. This ensures:

• Immutable, version-controlled deployments
• Rollback capability with Git history
• Environment consistency across dev, staging, and prod

Whether deploying a legacy .NET Framework app or a modern .NET 8 microservice, this strategy allows you to modernize without losing control.

Keep Up with Windows Containerization Trends

Windows container support in Kubernetes continues to improve—but it's not identical to Linux. Certain features, such as privileged containers, hostPath volumes, and PodSecurityContexts, may not yet be fully supported on Windows.

To stay up to date:

• Regularly check the official Kubernetes Windows docs
• Monitor release notes for Windows-specific enhancements
• Test new Kubernetes versions in staging before upgrading production

Plural simplifies version management with automated upgrade workflows and observability built-in. You can see the health of your clusters—Windows and Linux—from a single-pane-of-glass dashboard, identify breaking changes, and plan upgrades with minimal downtime.

Related Articles

• What is Kubernetes Used For? Explained Simply
• Kubernetes Pod vs. Container: What You Must Know
• What is a Kubernetes Cluster? Your Complete Guide
• Kubernetes Terminology: A 2023 Guide
• Master Kubernetes Networking: A Deep Dive Guide

Frequently Asked Questions

Why should I containerize my legacy .NET applications for Kubernetes? The main reason is to modernize your applications without undertaking a complete, and often expensive, rewrite. By placing your existing .NET Framework applications into Windows containers, you can manage them with the same declarative, API-driven tools you use for your Linux workloads. This breaks down the operational silos between different application stacks and allows a single platform team to manage the entire portfolio using a consistent workflow, which is a core problem that a fleet management platform like Plural is built to solve.

Can I really manage Windows and Linux nodes in the same cluster without creating operational chaos? Yes, you absolutely can. The key is to enforce consistency through automation. Kubernetes handles the scheduling logic using node selectors and taints to ensure Windows pods land on Windows nodes. The real challenge comes from managing configurations, deployments, and observability across this hybrid environment at scale. Plural addresses this by providing a single control plane and GitOps-based continuous deployment, allowing you to define and sync your application configurations to all clusters from one place, regardless of the operating system.

What's the most common pitfall when managing Windows nodes, and how can I avoid it? The most common mistake is under-provisioning resources. Windows containers and the OS itself have a significantly larger resource footprint than their Linux counterparts. Teams often allocate the same CPU, memory, and disk space they would for a Linux node, which leads to performance bottlenecks and pod evictions. You can avoid this by monitoring your nodes closely from the start. Plural's observability features give you a unified view of resource utilization across your entire fleet, helping you proactively identify and scale your Windows nodes before they become constrained.

How does networking for Windows pods differ from Linux, and what do I need to watch out for? The underlying networking stack in Windows is fundamentally different, which means you can't use just any Container Network Interface (CNI) plugin that works on Linux. You must select a CNI that explicitly supports Windows, like Azure CNI for AKS. Additionally, features like network policies and host networking behave differently. When setting up your cluster, you need to carefully plan for pod-to-pod and pod-to-service communication to ensure your network architecture is sound and secure for a Windows environment.

How does Plural simplify user access and permissions for Windows clusters? Plural streamlines access by integrating directly with your company's identity provider (OIDC). Instead of juggling individual kubeconfig files and service account tokens, your team can access all clusters through a single, secure dashboard using their existing SSO credentials. We use Kubernetes Impersonation, which means you can apply RBAC policies directly to a user's email or group. This allows you to manage permissions centrally and enforce consistent security rules across your entire fleet of Windows and Linux clusters.