Scaling Kubernetes on AWS Without Surprises

Teams often scale too late or too aggressively. A better approach is to pair autoscaling with explicit guardrails.

What I optimize first

• Pod resource requests and limits based on measured profiles
• Horizontal pod autoscaler thresholds per endpoint class
• Cluster autoscaler behavior for burst traffic windows

Deployment safety

Blue-green or progressive rollouts are mandatory for high-traffic services. The point is reducing blast radius, not chasing deployment speed.