1. Install Radius

Install Radius on a Kubernetes cluster and initialize your first application

In part one, you will install Radius on an existing Kubernetes cluster.

Prerequisites

For this guide you only need a Kubernetes cluster. To install Radius, your user must have the cluster-admin role. Radius supports AKS, EKS, k3d, and kind clusters. Running a local cluster with k3d or kind is recommended.

Install the Radius CLI

Install the Radius CLI on your workstation with the appropriate installation script:


Run the following in a PowerShell window:

iwr -useb "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/radius-project/radius/main/deploy/install.ps1" | iex

You may need to refresh your $PATH environment variable to access rad:

$Env:Path = [System.Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable("Path","User")

Run the following in a console window:

winget install --exact --id Radius.Radius


curl -fsSL "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/radius-project/radius/main/deploy/install.sh" | /bin/bash


wget -q "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/radius-project/radius/main/deploy/install.sh" -O - | /bin/bash

Open in GitHub Codespaces


Visit Radius GitHub releases to select and download a specific version of the Radius CLI.

Verify the Radius CLI is installed correctly by running rad version.

Install Radius

Create a new directory for the Radius Demo application:

mkdir radius
cd radius

Ensure your cluster is set as your current context with kubectl config current-context. If the context needs updating, change it with kubectl config set-context <context-name>. Then install Radius with the rad initialize command:

rad initialize --preview

Select Yes to set up an application in the current directory.

Example output:

Initializing Radius...

✅ Install Radius v0.61
    - Kubernetes cluster: k3d-k3s-default
    - Kubernetes namespace: radius-system
✅ Create new environment default
    - Kubernetes namespace: default
    - Recipe pack: default
✅ Scaffold application radius
✅ Update local configuration

Initialization complete! Have a RAD time 😎

Verify the pods are running:

kubectl get pods -n radius-system

You should see output similar to:

NAME                                  READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
applications-rp-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx      1/1     Running   0          1m
bicep-de-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx             1/1     Running   0          1m
contour-contour-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx      1/1     Running   0          1m
contour-envoy-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx        1/1     Running   0          1m
controller-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx           1/1     Running   0          1m
dashboard-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx            1/1     Running   0          1m
dynamic-rp-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx           1/1     Running   0          1m
ucp-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx                  1/1     Running   0          1m

For more details on installing Radius, see How to Install Radius.

Next steps

In part two of this guide, you will deploy the Radius Demo sample application.

Next step: Deploy an application