etcd Backup, Restore, and Disaster Recovery

Every Kubernetes cluster has one critical vulnerability: etcd. When the control plane boots, it reads cluster state from etcd. When you create a Deployment, the kube-apiserver writes to etcd. If etcd data is lost or corrupted, your cluster is dead—even if all your nodes are running perfectly.

That's why the CKA exam tests your ability to back up and restore etcd. But this isn't just about passing an exam. In production, you'll need a working disaster recovery plan before something actually goes wrong. This article walks through the exact commands and procedures you'll use when etcd fails.