---
title: Customize pods
description: You can customize the Pods created for each Elastic Stack application by modifying the respective podTemplate field in the manifest. Pod templates allow...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/4850/deploy-manage/deploy/cloud-on-k8s/customize-pods
products:
  - Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes
  - Elastic Documentation
applies_to:
  - Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes: Generally available
---

# Customize pods
You can customize the Pods created for each Elastic Stack application by modifying the respective `podTemplate` field in the manifest. Pod templates allow you to define labels, annotations, environment variables, volume mounts, and other custom configuration settings that are then merged with the default Pod configuration generated by ECK to produce the final Pod definition that gets deployed to the Kubernetes cluster.
The following example illustrates how to add a custom label, annotation, and an environment variable using the `podTemplate` field.
```yaml
apiVersion: elasticsearch.k8s.elastic.co/v1
kind: Elasticsearch
metadata:
  name: quickstart
spec:
  version: 9.5.7
  nodeSets:
  - name: default
    count: 1
    podTemplate:
      metadata:
        labels:
          my.custom.domain/label: "label-value"
        annotations:
          my.custom.domain/annotation: "annotation-value"
      spec:
        containers:
          - name: elasticsearch
            env:
              - name: ES_JAVA_OPTS
                value: "-Xms4g -Xmx4g"
```

```yaml
apiVersion: kibana.k8s.elastic.co/v1
kind: Kibana
metadata:
  name: quickstart
spec:
  version: 9.5.7
  count: 1
  podTemplate:
    metadata:
      labels:
        my.custom.domain/label: "label-value"
      annotations:
        my.custom.domain/annotation: "annotation-value"
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: kibana
          env:
            - name: NODE_OPTIONS
              value:  "--max-old-space-size=2048"  
          resources:
            requests:
              memory: 2Gi
              cpu: 0.5
            limits:
              memory: 2.5Gi
              cpu: 2
```

<note>
  Configuration for other Elastic Stack applications, like APM Server, or Beats, is identical to the Kibana configuration except for the `apiVersion` and `kind` fields.
</note>

The following example shows how it’s also possible to customize the init containers created as part of the Pods to initialize the filesystem or to manage the keystores.
```yaml
apiVersion: elasticsearch.k8s.elastic.co/v1
kind: Elasticsearch
metadata:
  name: quickstart
spec:
  version: 9.5.7
  nodeSets:
    - name: default
      count: 3
      podTemplate:
        spec:
          initContainers:
          - name: elastic-internal-init-keystore
            resources:
              limits:
                cpu: 1000m
                memory: 368Mi
              requests:
                cpu: 1000m
                memory: 368Mi
  secureSettings:
  - secretName: es-secret
```


## Container and init container names

To customize the containers that ECK creates, use the same container and init container names as the operator. ECK merges your settings with its defaults only for containers that have the expected name. If you use a different name for the main container, ECK still creates its own container with the default settings, and your container runs as an additional container in the Pod without the operator configuration. As a result, settings such as resources and environment variables that you specify for your container don't apply to the main container.
The following table lists the container names that ECK uses:

| Resource                       | Main container name                                                                      | Init container names                                                                                                                    |
|--------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Elasticsearch                  | `elasticsearch`                                                                          | `elastic-internal-init-filesystem`, `elastic-internal-suspend`, and `elastic-internal-init-keystore` when you configure secure settings |
| Kibana                         | `kibana`                                                                                 | `elastic-internal-init`, and `elastic-internal-init-keystore` when you configure secure settings                                        |
| APM Server                     | `apm-server`                                                                             | `elastic-internal-init-keystore` when you configure secure settings                                                                     |
| Beats                          | The name of the Beat in lower case, for example `filebeat`, `metricbeat`, or `heartbeat` | `elastic-internal-init-keystore` when you configure secure settings                                                                     |
| Elastic Agent and Fleet Server | `agent`                                                                                  | None                                                                                                                                    |
| Logstash                       | `logstash`                                                                               | `logstash-internal-init-config`, and `elastic-internal-init-keystore` when you configure secure settings                                |
| Elastic Maps Server            | `maps`                                                                                   | None                                                                                                                                    |
| Elastic Package Registry       | `package-registry`                                                                       | None                                                                                                                                    |
| AutoOps agent                  | `autoops-agent`                                                                          | None                                                                                                                                    |


## More examples

- [Init containers for plugin downloads](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/4850/deploy-manage/plugins-and-custom-configuration-files/cloud-on-k8s/init-containers-for-plugin-downloads)
- [*Manage compute resources*](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/4850/deploy-manage/deploy/cloud-on-k8s/manage-compute-resources)

For further information:
- [Pod templates overview](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/workloads/pods/pod-overview/#pod-templates)
- [Pod template spec API reference](https://kubernetes.io/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.25/#podtemplatespec-v1-core)