PodCondition

PodCondition is a data structure in the Kubernetes API used to describe a specific aspect of a Pod’s status as observed by the control plane. Each Pod has a list of conditions in PodStatus.conditions that record the progress and health of the pod. The condition types are defined as PodConditionType and include PodScheduled, Initialized, Ready, and ContainersReady.

A PodCondition consists of several fields. Type identifies the kind of condition (for example, PodScheduled or Ready). Status indicates the current state of that condition and can be True, False, or Unknown. LastProbeTime and LastTransitionTime are timestamps that record when the condition was last probed and when its status last changed, respectively. Reason and Message provide human-readable context for the condition’s status.

The four standard condition types capture key aspects of a pod’s lifecycle. PodScheduled reflects whether the pod has been assigned to a node. Initialized indicates that initialization steps have completed. Ready signifies that the pod is ready to serve requests, often meaning readiness probes pass. ContainersReady indicates that all containers in the pod are ready. Together, these conditions offer a granular view of progress toward the overall pod readiness.

Usage of PodCondition supports decision-making for scheduling, traffic routing, and lifecycle management. Kubernetes components and clients examine PodStatus.conditions to determine if a pod is ready for traffic, to trigger scaling or deletion, and to surface status in tools like kubectl describe pod. The conditions are updated by the kubelet and the API server as the pod progresses through its lifecycle. See also PodStatus and PodSpec.