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Explore Kubernetes placement with Cluster X-Ray

Open Infrastructure → Cluster X-Ray to see observed Nodes and Pods in a 3D scene. The view uses the current project and global time window. The default Inventory view remains available beside it.

Explore the layers​

Drag to orbit, scroll or use the buttons to zoom, and select Reset camera to return to the initial isometric view. Toggle Pods, Nodes or logical infrastructure; adjust Spacing to separate the layers and X-Ray transparency to look through their surfaces. The infrastructure layer is illustrative: it does not identify a discovered physical chassis or cloud instance type.

Use node, namespace and Pod filters to narrow the view. Select a Pod in the scene or through Select Pod to inspect, which also works from the keyboard. Its inspector shows the recorded node, namespace, workload, CPU usage in cores and memory usage. Kubernetes readiness and resource limits are not available here. Isolate neighbourhood keeps the selected Pod and its observed neighbours.

Selection and filters are preserved in the URL. If a selected Pod is outside the current filters or time window, the inspector says so instead of substituting a different Pod.

Read connections​

The Hub reads Client spans and matches Server children by tenant, trace and span identity. Pod names, namespaces and node names come from resource attributes. Service dependencies are never distributed arbitrarily between replicas.

  • Lines show observed request direction. A line with errors uses the error color.
  • Counts, errors and p95 latency are caller-side measurements over the selected window.
  • A recorded destination address without a matched Pod appears at the unresolved peers globe. Its location is unknown; the globe does not claim public Internet access.
  • Particle speed is illustrative, not a request-rate measurement. Use Pause flows to stop it. Reduced-motion preferences pause animation automatically.

Missing Pod identities mean missing attributed connections. They do not imply that a Pod has no traffic. A failed connection read shows a retry action while placement remains available. No additional sensor option or application change is required; existing spans must carry the relevant Kubernetes resource attributes.

Large inventories and browser support​

The scene displays up to 9 nodes, 12 Pods per node and 100 connections. Visible counts state when objects are omitted. The inventory query loads up to 200 Pods per node filter, ordered by CPU. Narrow the node or Pod filter to bring an omitted Pod into view. The selector can inspect loaded Pods outside the scene limit.

The 3D engine loads only when this view opens. Hidden and offscreen scenes stop rendering. If WebGL is unavailable, use Open inventory. The scene uses a dark surface in both application themes; the surrounding interface follows your theme.

See the metrics guide and Pod connection API.