A/B testing with Ingress in Kubernetes - Mini Project: Build & Apply

A/B Testing with Ingress in Kubernetes

📖 Scenario: You are working as a DevOps engineer for a web application team. They want to test two versions of their website to see which one users prefer. This is called A/B testing. You will use Kubernetes Ingress to route 50% of the traffic to version A and 50% to version B.

🎯 Goal: Set up a Kubernetes Ingress resource that splits incoming traffic evenly between two backend services named version-a and version-b. This will enable A/B testing by sending half of the users to each version.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an Ingress resource named ab-testing-ingress

Use the nginx Ingress controller annotations for traffic splitting

Route traffic to two services: version-a and version-b

Split traffic evenly: 50% to version-a and 50% to version-b

Use the host example.com and path /

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

A/B testing helps teams improve websites by comparing two versions with real users. Kubernetes Ingress can route traffic to different versions easily.

💼 Career

DevOps engineers often configure Ingress controllers for traffic management, load balancing, and testing new application versions safely.

1

Create the basic Ingress resource

Create a Kubernetes Ingress resource named ab-testing-ingress with host example.com and path / that routes all traffic to the service version-a on port 80. Use the networking.k8s.io/v1 API version.

Kubernetes

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Define an Ingress with one rule for host example.com and path /. Set the backend service to version-a on port 80.

2

Add annotation for traffic splitting

Add the annotation nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary with value "true" to the Ingress metadata to enable canary traffic splitting.

Kubernetes

apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: ab-testing-ingress
  # Add the annotation below
  # Your code here
spec:
  rules:
  - host: example.com
    http:
      paths:
      - path: /
        pathType: Prefix
        backend:
          service:
            name: version-a
            port:
              number: 80

Need a hint?

Add the annotation under metadata with key nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary and value "true".

3

Add the canary backend with weight

Add a second path entry under spec.rules[0].http.paths with the same path / and pathType Prefix. Set the backend service name to version-b and port number to 80. Add the annotations nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary-weight with value 50 to split traffic evenly.

Kubernetes

apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: ab-testing-ingress
  annotations:
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary: "true"
spec:
  rules:
  - host: example.com
    http:
      paths:
      - path: /
        pathType: Prefix
        backend:
          service:
            name: version-a
            port:
              number: 80
      # Add the canary path for version-b below
      # Your code here

Need a hint?

Add a second path with the same / path and backend service version-b. Add the annotation nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary-weight: "50" to split traffic evenly.

4

Display the final Ingress YAML

Print the complete Ingress YAML configuration to verify the A/B testing setup.

Kubernetes

apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: ab-testing-ingress
  annotations:
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary: "true"
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/canary-weight: "50"
spec:
  rules:
  - host: example.com
    http:
      paths:
      - path: /
        pathType: Prefix
        backend:
          service:
            name: version-a
            port:
              number: 80
      - path: /
        pathType: Prefix
        backend:
          service:
            name: version-b
            port:
              number: 80

# Print the YAML below
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use print statements to output the full Ingress YAML exactly as configured.