# Self-hosted Kubernetes dashboard for small platform teams

Berth runs inside your cluster as one container. It shows why an endpoint is down, where capacity is going, and what the logs say, and it can answer questions with a read-only AI assistant. Viewing is free and needs no account.

## What is Berth?

Berth is a self-hosted Kubernetes dashboard for trusted cluster administrators. The whole application ships as one container (a web app embedded in a small Go binary) that you run in your cluster with Helm, or locally against your kubeconfig. There is no hosted service in the path, and license keys are verified offline.

## How do I install it?

```sh
helm upgrade --install berth oci://ghcr.io/unishsys/charts/berth \
  --namespace berth --create-namespace
kubectl -n berth get secret berth-secrets -o jsonpath='{.data.AUTH_TOKEN}' | base64 -d ; echo
kubectl -n berth port-forward svc/berth 8081:8081
```

Open http://localhost:8081/ and paste the token. Helm 3.8 or newer is required. More options: https://berth.cloudguys.io/install/

## What does it show?

- Endpoint health for each exposed hostname (DNS, TLS, Gateway, route, Service, backend readiness), built on Gateway API, with the first broken link named.
- Capacity per node pool: allocatable, reserved and used CPU and memory, pod density, and the binding constraint.
- Live pod logs and events next to the failing resource.
- Cluster-aware builders, an expose-an-app flow, weighted traffic splitting, and scale, restart and YAML edit for deployments.
- An optional read-only AI assistant on your own Ollama server, or on Claude with your own key (Enterprise).

## What does Berth not do?

Berth is a single-cluster tool for trusted administrators. Everyone who can sign in shares the dashboard's Kubernetes permissions. There is no SSO or OIDC, no per-user authorization, no audit viewer and no multi-cluster management. It runs as a single replica and is a live view, not historical monitoring. Dashboard access equals cluster access.

## The official Kubernetes Dashboard is archived. Where does Berth fit?

The Kubernetes Dashboard project (https://github.com/kubernetes-retired/dashboard) is archived and no longer maintained, and its README recommends Headlamp (https://headlamp.dev/). Berth is a different, commercial tool. If you need multi-cluster views, SSO or per-user permissions, Headlamp is the better fit today. Berth suits a single cluster where you want endpoint-chain troubleshooting, a capacity view, and an AI assistant that cannot change anything.

## Questions

**Is Berth open source?** No. Berth is proprietary, freemium software and its source is not public. The Helm chart and documentation are public, and the container image and binaries are free to download.

**Is Berth free?** Viewing your cluster is always free and needs no key or account. A free Community key, which you get by signing in on this website, lets you make changes on a single cluster of up to 10 nodes. Larger clusters use Enterprise, with the node allowance agreed per deployment.

**Does Berth send my cluster data anywhere?** License keys are verified offline, so licensing does not call a server. The optional AI assistant sends the conversation and tool results to the model provider you choose: your own Ollama server stays inside your network, while Claude through Anthropic or Amazon Bedrock (Enterprise) goes to that provider under your own account.

**Can the AI assistant change my cluster?** No. Every tool the assistant has is read-only. It proposes fixes for you to review and apply with your own access.

**Does Berth support Gateway API and Ingress?** Endpoint health follows Gateway API: hostname, DNS, TLS, Gateway, HTTPRoute, Service and backend readiness. Ingress resources can be listed and created, but they are not part of the endpoint-health view.

**Who is Berth for?** Trusted cluster administrators on a single cluster. Per-user authorization, SSO and multi-cluster management are not available.