How Do I Evict All Pods on a Node?

You can run the kubectl drain command to safely evict all pods from a node.

By default, the kubectl drain command retains some system pods, for example, everest-csi-driver.

1. Use kubectl to connect to the cluster.
2. Check the nodes in the cluster.

   kubectl get node

3. Select a node and view all pods on the node.

   kubectl get pod --all-namespaces -owide --field-selector spec.nodeName=192.168.0.160

   The pods on the node before eviction are as follows:

   NAMESPACE     NAME                                      READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE     IP              NODE            NOMINATED NODE   READINESS GATES
   default       nginx-5bcc57c74b-lgcvh                    1/1     Running   0          7m25s   10.0.0.140      192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>
   kube-system   coredns-6fcd88c4c-97p6s                   1/1     Running   0          3h16m   10.0.0.138      192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>
   kube-system   everest-csi-controller-56796f47cc-99dtm   1/1     Running   0          3h16m   10.0.0.139      192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>
   kube-system   everest-csi-driver-dpfzl                  2/2     Running   2          12d     192.168.0.160   192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>
   kube-system   icagent-tpfpv                             1/1     Running   1          12d     192.168.0.160   192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>

4. Evict all pods on the node.

   kubectl drain 192.168.0.160

   If a pod mounted with local storage or controlled by a DaemonSet exists on the node, the message "eerror: unable to drain node "192.168.0.160" due to error: cannot delete DaemonSet-managed Pods..." will be displayed. The eviction command does not take effect. You can add the following parameters to the end of the preceding command to forcibly evict the pod:

   • --delete-emptydir-data: forcibly evicts pods mounted with local storage, for example, coredns.
   • --ignore-daemonsets: forcibly evicts the DaemonSet pods, for example, everest-csi-driver.

   In the example, both types of pods exist on the node. Therefore, the eviction command is as follows:

   kubectl drain 192.168.0.160 --delete-emptydir-data --ignore-daemonsets

5. After the eviction, the node is automatically marked as unschedulable. That is, the node is tainted node.kubernetes.io/unschedulable = : NoSchedule.

   After the eviction, only system pods are retained on the node.

   NAMESPACE     NAME                       READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE   IP              NODE            NOMINATED NODE   READINESS GATES
   kube-system   everest-csi-driver-dpfzl   2/2     Running   2          12d   192.168.0.160   192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>
   kube-system   icagent-tpfpv              1/1     Running   1          12d   192.168.0.160   192.168.0.160   <none>           <none>