# aws/aws-eks-best-practices

A best practices guide for day 2 operations, including operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, and cost optimization.

Repository: https://github.com/aws/aws-eks-best-practices
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/aws-eks-best-practices
Homepage: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/best-practices/introduction.html
Language: Python
License: NOASSERTION
License Family: other
Last push: 2026-08-21T20:06:28+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 76/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 98, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 2506, "days_push": 12, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases, no_license
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 2157, forks 567 (observed 2026-08-28T04:06:19.805661+00:00)

## What it is
A community-contributed best practices guide for Amazon EKS covering day 2 operations such as security, reliability, autoscaling, networking, upgrades, and cost optimization. It is the source for the official Amazon EKS docs best practices guide and includes a companion Python CLI called hardeneks.

## Use cases
- harden security of an EKS cluster
- plan an EKS cluster version upgrade
- choose between Karpenter and cluster-autoscaler
- optimize EKS costs
- configure EKS networking best practices
- run AI/ML workloads on EKS
- audit EKS cluster against best practices

## When to choose
- you operate Amazon EKS clusters and want authoritative day 2 operational guidance
- you are preparing for cluster upgrades, autoscaling, or security reviews on EKS
- you want AWS-recommended patterns for running Windows, hybrid, or AI/ML workloads on EKS

## When to avoid
- you run Kubernetes outside AWS (e.g., vanilla k8s, GKE, AKS) with no EKS-specific services
- you need executable tooling rather than guidance (use the companion hardeneks CLI instead)
- you need a tutorial or step-by-step setup guide rather than operational best practices

## Facets
- artifact type: learning-resource
- maturity: active
- function: documentation, security, developer-tools
- domain: cloud-computing, infrastructure-as-code, self-hosted
- platform: cloud
- tags: eks, kubernetes, best-practices, aws, day-2-operations, cost-optimization, cluster-autoscaling, hardeneks, devops, containers

## Member repositories
- aws/aws-eks-best-practices (main) score 76

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:19.805661+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T02:50:23.499574+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/aws/aws-eks-best-practices (fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:19.805661+00:00, sha 3ba1f4ff5f4a)
  - homepage: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/best-practices/introduction.html (fetched 2026-08-29T10:30:19.559171+00:00, sha 937fe847290d)
  - site_page: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/index.html (fetched 2026-08-29T10:30:19.568343+00:00, sha cdef89dbc642)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.