Enterprise apps rely on multi-cluster architectures
Enterprises quickly moved beyond initial adoption of Kubernetes clusters into advanced production use cases. While single clusters are fine for preproduction or small-scale applications, the enterprise need for increased reliability, geographic distribution, data sovereignty, as well as superior isolation and fault tolerance make multi-cluster architectures essential. It’s also expected that 95% of new AI deployments will use Kubernetes, up from less than 30% in 2025, increasing demand.1
But the expanded complexity around managing multi-cluster traffic, consistent security enforcement, and app delivery can quickly become operationally overwhelming, resulting in potential performance degradation, security gaps, and application downtime.
Multi-cluster app delivery made simple
F5 and Nutanix jointly address these challenges by combining the application delivery and security capabilities of F5 BIG-IP with the simplicity and operational consistency of the Nutanix Kubernetes Platform (NKP).
NKP is an enterprise-grade solution designed to simplify the deployment, management, and operation of Kubernetes clusters across hybrid and multicloud environments. F5 BIG-IP Container Ingress Services is like a bridge between NKP managed Kubernetes clusters and your BIG-IP solutions, including F5 BIG-IP Advanced WAF and F5 BIG-IP DNS. It serves as a unified north-south control plane and intelligent front door for all Kubernetes clusters, centralizing traffic management and visibility.
BIG-IP Container Ingress Services listens to the Kubernetes API in real time for container management events, such as new clusters or pods being created. It then translates native-Kubernetes resources into BIG-IP configurations.
The result is a shift for BIG-IP from an external appliance into a declarative, automated extension of the NKP environment that enables cloud‑native workflows and eliminates manual, error‑prone configurations.
Traffic management and load balancing across clusters
BIG-IP Container Ingress Services exposes multiple applications distributed across Kubernetes clusters through a single BIG‑IP Virtual Server, enabling centralized traffic management and load balancing as applications scale or shift. Ingress services for containerized apps provide ingress control for HTTP routing, load balancing, security, and programmability in containerized environments.
In addition, BIG-IP Container Ingress Services can automatically configure static routes on BIG‑IP using the subnets assigned to Kubernetes cluster nodes. This enables BIG‑IP to route directly to Kubernetes pod subnets without requiring any tunnel configuration, greatly simplifying the networking architecture.
Automated orchestration and reduced operational overhead
BIG-IP Container Ingress Services event‑driven automation aligns with NKP streamlined cluster lifecycle management, reducing manual configuration and operational complexity. By watching the Kubernetes API in NKP-managed clusters, BIG-IP dynamically updates application services in response to cluster events, ensuring application delivery configuration adapts as workloads change. Predefined templates simplify policy management, and support for Helm Charts enables repeatable Kubernetes deployments.
Consistent security policies
BIG-IP Advanced WAF offers centralized security policy management to simplify protection against known and zero-day threats, layer 7 DDoS attacks, OWASP Top 10, and more. BIG-IP Container Ingress Services makes it possible to extend existing WAF policy coverage to containerized applications, so organizations can maintain a consistent security posture without added operational overhead.
Flexible deployment topology: standalone or high availability
BIG-IP Container Ingress Services supports both standalone and high‑availability deployments in multi-cluster environments, enabling resilient application exposure across Kubernetes clusters. In high-availability deployment, CIS provides controller redundancy, ensuring continuous monitoring of the Kubernetes API and uninterrupted BIG-IP configuration updates if the primary instance becomes unavailable.
F5 BIG-IP Container Ingress Services with multi-cluster support is a strategic enabler for businesses relying on both Kubernetes and BIG-IP. By simplifying the management of multi-cluster environments, organizations can focus more on innovation and less on multi-cluster application operational complexities.
Learn more about multi-cluster application delivery with F5 and Nutanix on DevCentral and visit our partnership page at f5.com/nutanix.
1Gartner, Gartner Magic Quadrant for Container Management, August 2025
KEY BENEFITS
Simplified app delivery
Orchestrate and scale application delivery services seamlessly across multiple Kubernetes clusters.
Improved performance
Ensure efficient traffic distribution by keeping BIG-IP configuration in sync with Kubernetes resources.
Reduced operational overhead
Auto-scale and secure application services by subscribing to Kubernetes container events; speed deployments with predefined BIG-IP templates and support for AS3.
Security policy consistency
Extend existing WAF policies to containerized applications with centralized policy management and consistent enforcement.