Upgrade AKO using Helm

Overview

This page describes how to upgrade Aerospike Kubernetes Operator (AKO) to the latest version using Helm.

Prerequisites

Helm 3.x

Do not skip intermediate AKO versions if you are starting from version 3.0.0. Upgrade to version 4.0.2 or later before upgrading to version 4.1.2:

Upgrade to 4.0.2

Upgrade CRD

Helm 3.x does not support the upgrade of Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs). You need to manually upgrade the CRD.

Replace the old CRDs with the new CRD:

Do not remove the old CRDs. This deletes all the Aerospike related CRs like AerospikeClusters, AerospikeBackups. Do not use kubectl replace with the --force flag as this also deletes all the Aerospike related CRs.

kubectl replace -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aerospike/aerospike-kubernetes-operator/v4.1.2/config/crd/bases/asdb.aerospike.com_aerospikeclusters.yaml
kubectl replace -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aerospike/aerospike-kubernetes-operator/v4.1.2/config/crd/bases/asdb.aerospike.com_aerospikebackupservices.yaml
kubectl replace -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aerospike/aerospike-kubernetes-operator/v4.1.2/config/crd/bases/asdb.aerospike.com_aerospikebackups.yaml
kubectl replace -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aerospike/aerospike-kubernetes-operator/v4.1.2/config/crd/bases/asdb.aerospike.com_aerospikerestores.yaml

Run the following command to add the Helm repository.
Terminal window
```
helm repo add aerospike https://aerospike.github.io/aerospike-kubernetes-enterprise
```
If the Helm repository is already added, update the index:
```
helm repo update
```

Run the following command to upgrade AKO:

helm upgrade aerospike-kubernetes-operator aerospike/aerospike-kubernetes-operator --version=4.1.2

Check AKO logs

AKO runs as two replicas by default for higher availability. Run the following command to follow the logs for the AKO pods.

kubectl -n RELEASE_NAMESPACE logs -f deployments/aerospike-kubernetes-operator manager

Sample output:

2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   Initializing webhook certificate watcher using provided certificates    {"webhook-cert-path": "/tmp/k8s-webhook-server/serving-certs", "webhook-cert-name": "tls.crt", "webhook-cert-key": "tls.key"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.certwatcher  Updated current TLS certificate
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   Init aerospike-server config schemas
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "6.0.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "6.3.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "7.1.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "8.0.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "8.1.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "6.1.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "6.2.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "6.4.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "7.0.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    DEBUG   setup   Config schema added     {"version": "7.2.0"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a mutating webhook  {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1, Kind=AerospikeCluster", "path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1-aerospikecluster"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1-aerospikecluster"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a validating webhook        {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1, Kind=AerospikeCluster", "path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1-aerospikecluster"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1-aerospikecluster"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a mutating webhook  {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeBackupService", "path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackupservice"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackupservice"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a validating webhook        {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeBackupService", "path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackupservice"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackupservice"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a mutating webhook  {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeBackup", "path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackup"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackup"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a validating webhook        {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeBackup", "path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackup"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikebackup"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a mutating webhook  {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeRestore", "path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikerestore"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/mutate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikerestore"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.builder      Registering a validating webhook        {"GVK": "asdb.aerospike.com/v1beta1, Kind=AerospikeRestore", "path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikerestore"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Registering webhook     {"path": "/validate-asdb-aerospike-com-v1beta1-aerospikerestore"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   Adding webhook certificate watcher to manager
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   Starting manager
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.metrics      Starting metrics server
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    starting server {"name": "health probe", "addr": "[::]:8081"}
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   disabling http/2
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Starting webhook server
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    setup   disabling http/2
2025-08-06T08:42:37Z    INFO    controller-runtime.webhook      Serving webhook server  {"host": "", "port": 9443}