kubernetes/kops · error

name is required

Error message

name is required

What it means

NewCluster validates that opt.ClusterName is a non-empty string before doing anything else. Without a cluster name, kOps cannot build the cluster spec, locate the config store, or register the cluster in the registry, so it aborts immediately with this error.

Solutions

1. Pass the cluster name: `kops create cluster --name mycluster.example.com ...`
2. Set opt.ClusterName in NewClusterOptions before calling NewCluster
3. If a name was expected from a default, ensure KOPS_CLUSTER_NAME or equivalent config is set

Example fix

// before
kops create cluster --zones us-east-1a
// after
kops create cluster --name mycluster.example.com --zones us-east-1a

if opt == nil || strings.TrimSpace(opt.ClusterName) == "" {
    return fmt.Errorf("cluster name must be set before calling NewCluster")
}

func hasClusterName(opt *NewClusterOptions) bool {
    return opt != nil && strings.TrimSpace(opt.ClusterName) != ""
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling NewCluster (or RunCreateCluster / `kops create cluster`) with NewClusterOptions.ClusterName left as the empty string, e.g. the --name flag was not passed and no default was applied.

Common situations: Scripted `kops create cluster` invocations missing --name; automation that builds NewClusterOptions programmatically and forgets to set ClusterName; refactors that dropped the name field.

Understand the failure class

Background: "missing required argument" and "the following required arguments were not provided": what required-argument errors mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 20 libraries.

Related errors

• cluster is required
• host is required
• instance-group is required
• must specify ID of instance or name of node to delete
• must specify the name of the instance group to delete

AI-assisted analysis of kubernetes/kops@4c8573c808 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/57550fb838ef7f69. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at upup/pkg/fi/cloudup/new_cluster.go:222

type NewClusterResult struct {
	// Cluster is the initialized Cluster resource.
	Cluster *api.Cluster
	// InstanceGroups are the initialized InstanceGroup resources.
	InstanceGroups []*api.InstanceGroup
	// Channel is the loaded Channel object.
	Channel *api.Channel
}

// NewCluster initializes cluster and instance groups specifications as
// intended for newly created clusters.
// It is the responsibility of the caller to call cloudup.PerformAssignments() on
// the returned cluster spec.
func NewCluster(opt *NewClusterOptions, clientset simple.Clientset) (*NewClusterResult, error) {
	ctx := context.TODO()

	if opt.ClusterName == "" {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("name is required")
	}

	if opt.Channel == "" {
		opt.Channel = api.DefaultChannel
	}
	channel, err := api.LoadChannel(clientset.VFSContext(), opt.Channel)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, err
	}

	cluster := &api.Cluster{
		ObjectMeta: v1.ObjectMeta{
			Name: opt.ClusterName,
		},
	}

	cluster.Spec.Channel = opt.Channel
	if opt.KubernetesVersion == "" {

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