Chaos Mesh is a free, open-source platform for simulating faults in development, testing, and production environments. It runs on Kubernetes and manages experiments through CustomResourceDefinitions and the Kubernetes API. Supported fault areas include Pods, networks, DNS, HTTP, I/O, time, stress, kernels, block devices, JVMs, physical machines, and AWS, Azure, and GCP. Schedule, Workflow, and StatusCheck resources support recurring experiments, serial or parallel workflows, and application health checks. Selectors and namespace controls help target experiments and limit their scope. Chaos Dashboard provides a web interface and HTTP API for creating, managing, and observing experiments, with role-based access control enabled by default. Chaos Daemon runs as a privileged Kubernetes DaemonSet by default, though that permission can be disabled. The software uses the Apache License 2.0, and its Helm repository supports Helm 3. Kubernetes compatibility depends on the release: version 2.8 supports Kubernetes 1.30 through 1.35, while 2.7 supports 1.26 through 1.28. Community support is available through CNCF Slack and GitHub Discussions.
Who it is for
Chaos Mesh suits teams that run Kubernetes and want to simulate faults across development, testing, or production environments. Its controls support teams that need to scope experiments to selected targets.
What is good
- Free and licensed under Apache License 2.0.
- Supports recurring and serial or parallel experiments.
- Dashboard includes a web interface and HTTP API.
- RBAC is enabled by default.
What to know first
- Chaos Daemon is privileged by default.
- Kubernetes support depends on the release.
- RemoteCluster is described as being in an early stage.
- Dashboard data may be lost after reboot without persistent volumes.
Verdict
Chaos Mesh offers broad fault simulation and Kubernetes-native experiment controls. Operators should account for its privileged daemon default and verify compatibility with their Kubernetes version.
Chaos Mesh plans and pricing
All plansCompared on chaos engineering platforms
- Free plan
- Yes
- Kubernetes support
- Yes
- Cloud fault injection
- Yes
- Network fault injection
- Yes
- Experiment scheduling
- Yes
- Deployment model
- self_hosted
- Blast-radius controls
- Yes
