Helm (v1.x)

Deploying ClickStack with the v1.x inline-template Helm chart

Deprecated — v1.x chart

This page documents the v1.x inline-template Helm chart, which is in maintenance mode and will no longer receive new features. For new deployments, use the v2.x chart. To migrate an existing v1.x deployment, see the Upgrade guide.

The helm chart for ClickStack can be found here and is the recommended method for production deployments.

By default, the Helm chart provisions all core components, including:

• ClickHouse
• HyperDX
• OpenTelemetry (OTel) collector
• MongoDB (for persistent application state)

However, it can be easily customized to integrate with an existing ClickHouse deployment - for example, one hosted in ClickHouse Cloud.

The chart supports standard Kubernetes best practices, including:

• Environment-specific configuration via values.yaml
• Resource limits and pod-level scaling
• TLS and ingress configuration
• Secrets management and authentication setup

Suitable for

• Proof of concepts
• Production

Deployment steps

1. Prerequisites

   • Helm v3+
   • Kubernetes cluster (v1.20+ recommended)
   • kubectl configured to interact with your cluster
2. Add the ClickStack Helm repository

   Add the ClickStack Helm repository:

   helm repo add clickstack https://clickhouse.github.io/ClickStack-helm-charts
   helm repo update
   
3. Installing ClickStack

   To install the ClickStack chart with default values:

   helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack
   
4. Verify the installation

   Verify the installation:

   kubectl get pods -l "app.kubernetes.io/name=clickstack"
   

   When all pods are ready, proceed.

5. Forward ports

   Port forwarding allows us to access and set up HyperDX. Users deploying to production should instead expose the service via an ingress or load balancer to ensure proper network access, TLS termination, and scalability. Port forwarding is best suited for local development or one-off administrative tasks, not long-term or high-availability environments.

   kubectl port-forward \
     pod/$(kubectl get pod -l app.kubernetes.io/name=clickstack -o jsonpath='{.items[0].metadata.name}') \
     8080:3000
   

   Production Ingress Setup

   For production deployments, configure ingress with TLS instead of port forwarding. See the Ingress Configuration guide for detailed setup instructions.

6. Navigate to the UI

   Visit http://localhost:8080 to access the HyperDX UI.

   Create a user, providing a username and password which meets the requirements.

   On clicking Create, data sources will be created for the ClickHouse instance deployed with the Helm chart.

   Overriding default connection

   You can override the default connection to the integrated ClickHouse instance. For details, see “Using ClickHouse Cloud”.

7. Customizing values (optional)

   You can customize settings by using --set flags. For example:

   helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack --set key=value
   

   Alternatively, edit the values.yaml. To retrieve the default values:

   helm show values clickstack/clickstack > values.yaml
   

   Example config:

   replicaCount: 2
   resources:
     limits:
       cpu: 500m
       memory: 512Mi
     requests:
       cpu: 250m
       memory: 256Mi
   ingress:
     enabled: true
     annotations:
       kubernetes.io/ingress.class: nginx
     hosts:
       - host: hyperdx.example.com
         paths:
           - path: /
             pathType: ImplementationSpecific
   

   helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack -f values.yaml
   
8. Using secrets (optional)

   For handling sensitive data such as API keys or database credentials, use Kubernetes secrets. The HyperDX Helm charts provide default secret files that you can modify and apply to your cluster.

   Using pre-configured secrets

   The Helm chart includes a default secret template located at charts/clickstack/templates/secrets.yaml. This file provides a base structure for managing secrets.

   If you need to manually apply a secret, modify and apply the provided secrets.yaml template:

   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Secret
   metadata:
     name: hyperdx-secret
     annotations:
       "helm.sh/resource-policy": keep
   type: Opaque
   data:
     API_KEY: <base64-encoded-api-key>
   

   Apply the secret to your cluster:

   kubectl apply -f secrets.yaml
   

   Creating a custom secret

   If you prefer, you can create a custom Kubernetes secret manually:

   kubectl create secret generic hyperdx-secret \
     --from-literal=API_KEY=my-secret-api-key
   

   Referencing a secret

   To reference a secret in values.yaml:

   hyperdx:
     apiKey:
       valueFrom:
         secretKeyRef:
           name: hyperdx-secret
           key: API_KEY
   

   API Key Management

   For detailed API key setup instructions including multiple configuration methods and pod restart procedures, see the API Key Setup guide.

Using ClickHouse Cloud

If using ClickHouse Cloud users disable the ClickHouse instance deployed by the Helm chart and specify the Cloud credentials:

# specify ClickHouse Cloud credentials
export CLICKHOUSE_URL=<CLICKHOUSE_CLOUD_URL> # full https url
export CLICKHOUSE_USER=<CLICKHOUSE_USER>
export CLICKHOUSE_PASSWORD=<CLICKHOUSE_PASSWORD>

# how to overwrite default connection
helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack \
  --set clickhouse.enabled=false \
  --set clickhouse.persistence.enabled=false \
  --set otel.clickhouseEndpoint=${CLICKHOUSE_URL} \
  --set clickhouse.config.users.otelUser=${CLICKHOUSE_USER} \
  --set clickhouse.config.users.otelUserPassword=${CLICKHOUSE_PASSWORD}

Alternatively, use a values.yaml file:

clickhouse:
  enabled: false
  persistence:
    enabled: false
  config:
    users:
      otelUser: ${CLICKHOUSE_USER}
      otelUserPassword: ${CLICKHOUSE_PASSWORD}

otel:
  clickhouseEndpoint: ${CLICKHOUSE_URL}

hyperdx:
  defaultConnections: |
    [
      {
        "name": "External ClickHouse",
        "host": "http://your-clickhouse-server:8123",
        "port": 8123,
        "username": "your-username",
        "password": "your-password"
      }
    ]

helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack -f values.yaml
# or if installed...
# helm upgrade my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack -f values.yaml

Advanced External Configurations

For production deployments with secret-based configuration, external OTEL collectors, or minimal setups, see the Deployment Options guide.

Production notes

By default, this chart also installs ClickHouse and the OTel collector. However, for production, it is recommended that you manage ClickHouse and the OTel collector separately.

To disable ClickHouse and the OTel collector, set the following values:

helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack \
  --set clickhouse.enabled=false \
  --set clickhouse.persistence.enabled=false \
  --set otel.enabled=false

Production Best Practices

For production deployments including high availability configuration, resource management, ingress/TLS setup, and cloud-specific configurations (GKE, EKS, AKS), see:

• Configuration Guide - Ingress, TLS, and secrets management
• Cloud Deployments - Cloud-specific settings and production checklist

Task configuration

By default, there is one task in the chart setup as a cronjob, responsible for checking whether alerts should fire. Here are its configuration options:

Parameter	Description	Default
tasks.enabled	Enable/Disable cron tasks in the cluster. By default, the HyperDX image will run cron tasks in the process. Change to true if you’d rather use a separate cron task in the cluster.	false
tasks.checkAlerts.schedule	Cron schedule for the check-alerts task	*/1 * * * *
tasks.checkAlerts.resources	Resource requests and limits for the check-alerts task	See values.yaml

Upgrading the chart

To upgrade to a newer version:

helm upgrade my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack -f values.yaml

To check available chart versions:

helm search repo clickstack

Upgrading to v2.x

If you want to migrate to the v2.x subchart-based chart, see the Upgrade guide for migration instructions. This is a breaking change — an in-place helm upgrade is not supported.

Uninstalling ClickStack

To remove the deployment:

helm uninstall my-clickstack

This will remove all resources associated with the release, but persistent data (if any) may remain.

Troubleshooting

Checking logs

kubectl logs -l app.kubernetes.io/name=clickstack

Debugging a failed install

helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack --debug --dry-run

Verifying deployment

kubectl get pods -l app.kubernetes.io/name=clickstack

Additional Troubleshooting Resources

For ingress-specific issues, TLS problems, or cloud deployment troubleshooting, see:

• Ingress Troubleshooting - Asset serving, path rewrites, browser issues
• Cloud Deployments - GKE OpAMP issues and cloud-specific problems

Schema choice: Map vs JSON

ClickStack stores attributes as Map(LowCardinality(String), String) columns by default. This is the recommended schema for observability workloads. Combined with bucketed map serialization and text indexes on map keys and values, it provides selective lookups without the per-key ingest overhead of dynamic JSON subcolumns.

A JSON-typed schema is available in beta for evaluation on workloads with a small, stable attribute key-set. It is not recommended as the default. See Map vs JSON type for the full comparison and the env vars required to enable JSON support.

Related Documentation

v1.x deployment guides

• Deployment options (v1.x) - External ClickHouse, OTEL collector, and minimal deployments
• Configuration guide (v1.x) - API keys, secrets, and ingress setup
• Cloud deployments (v1.x) - GKE, EKS, AKS configurations and production best practices

v2.x documentation

• Helm (v2.x) - v2.x deployment guide
• Upgrade guide - Migrating from v1.x to v2.x

Additional resources

• ClickStack getting started guide - Introduction to ClickStack
• ClickStack Helm charts repository - Chart source code and values reference
• Kubernetes documentation - Kubernetes reference
• Helm documentation - Helm reference