Hands-on Lab·Kubernetes and Cloud Native Associate
SLOs, SLIs and Error Budgets
An SLO is not a document. It is a recording rule, a target and a subtraction. Build an availability SLI for your own API server, name it, and turn it into a burn rate you can alert on.
Observability Guide 41 of 46 Intermediate
- Kubernetes1.36.4
- Prometheus3.14.0
- kube-prometheus-stackinstalled in the monitoring namespace
- TimeAbout 19 min
- Reviewed22 August 2026
Written against the versions above. Recording rules and the `/api/v1/query` endpoint are stable Prometheus. The PrometheusRule CRD comes from the Prometheus Operator, which runs in this cluster's monitoring namespace.
| Server Name | IP Address | OS | Roles | CPU | RAM | HDD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CKA1001 | 192.168.0.175 | Ubuntu 26.04 LTS | Control Plane Node | 2 Core | 4 GB | 50 GB |
| CKA1001-NODE01 | 192.168.0.176 | Ubuntu 26.04 LTS | Worker Node | 2 Core | 4 GB | 50 GB |
Before you start
- The Prometheus install guide, since every query here goes to that server.
- The PromQL guide -
rate()and label matchers are assumed.
-
An SLI is a ratio you have to choose
-
A recording rule gives it a name
-
The error budget is the distance to the target
-
The third pillar you do not have