Health Checks Done Right: Liveness, Readiness, and Startup Probes
A health check that always returns 200 OK is worse than no health check at all. It gives you false confidence while your application silently fails. Let’s build health checks that actually tell you when something’s wrong. The Three Types of Probes Kubernetes defines three probe types, each serving a distinct purpose: Liveness Probe: “Is this process stuck?” If it fails, Kubernetes kills and restarts the container. Readiness Probe: “Can this instance handle traffic?” If it fails, the instance is removed from load balancing but keeps running. ...