EC
CreateContainerConfigError
KubernetesERRORCommonPod LifecycleHIGH confidence

Error creating container configuration

Production Risk

The application cannot start, leading to an outage or reduced capacity. This error stops a deployment completely.

What this means

The kubelet failed to create the configuration for a container. This error occurs before the container is even created and almost always points to a problem with mounting a resource like a ConfigMap or a Secret.

Why it happens
  1. 1A referenced ConfigMap or Secret does not exist
  2. 2Trying to mount a ConfigMap or Secret as a subPath that does not exist as a key within the resource
  3. 3Incorrect permissions preventing access to the required resources
How to reproduce

A pod fails to start, and its status shows CreateContainerConfigError.

trigger — this will error
trigger — this will error
kubectl describe pod my-pod

expected output

Events:
  Type     Reason                       Age              From               Message
  ----     ------                       ----             ----               -------
  Warning  Failed                       20s (x5 over 2m) kubelet            Error: CreateContainerConfigError: configmap "my-nonexistent-config" not found

Fix 1

Verify that the ConfigMap or Secret exists

WHEN The error message explicitly names a missing resource

Verify that the ConfigMap or Secret exists
kubectl get configmap my-nonexistent-config -n my-namespace

Why this works

This command checks if the named ConfigMap exists in the correct namespace. If it returns 'Not Found', the resource needs to be created or the pod spec needs to be corrected.

Fix 2

Check for missing keys in the resource

WHEN You are mounting a specific key from a ConfigMap or Secret as a file

Check for missing keys in the resource
kubectl get configmap my-config -o yaml

Why this works

Review the 'data' section of the ConfigMap's YAML output to ensure the key you are trying to mount exists.

What not to do

✕ Create an empty ConfigMap to satisfy the dependency

This will allow the pod to start, but the application will likely crash immediately if it depends on the data that is supposed to be in that ConfigMap.

Sources
Official documentation ↗

k8s.io/kubernetes/pkg/kubelet/kubelet_pods.go

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