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Helm (v1.x)

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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


Prerequisites

  • Helm v3+
  • Kubernetes cluster (v1.20+ recommended)
  • kubectl configured to interact with your cluster

Add the ClickStack Helm repository

Add the ClickStack Helm repository:

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

Installing ClickStack

To install the ClickStack chart with default values:

helm install my-clickstack clickstack/clickstack

Verify the installation

Verify the installation:

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

When all pods are ready, proceed.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

v1.x deployment guides

v2.x documentation

Additional resources

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