Uninstalling on Kubernetes

Below is the processes for uninstalling cert-manager on Kubernetes. There are two processes to chose depending on which method you used to install cert-manager - static manifests or helm.

Warning: To uninstall cert-manager you should always use the same process for installing but in reverse. Deviating from the following process whether cert-manager has been installed from static manifests or helm can cause issues and potentially broken states. Please ensure you follow the below steps when uninstalling to prevent this happening.

Before continuing, ensure that all cert-manager resources that have been created by users have been deleted. You can check for any existing resources with the following command:

$ kubectl get Issuers,ClusterIssuers,Certificates,CertificateRequests,Orders,Challenges --all-namespaces

Once all these resources have been deleted you are ready to uninstall cert-manager using the procedure determined by how you installed.

Uninstalling with regular manifests

Uninstalling from an installation with regular manifests is a case of running the installation process, in reverse, using the delete command of kubectl.

Delete the installation manifests using a link to your currently running version vX.Y.Z like so:

$ kubectl delete -f https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/releases/download/vX.Y.Z/cert-manager.yaml

Uninstalling with Helm

Uninstalling cert-manager from a helm installation is a case of running the installation process, in reverse, using the delete command on both kubectl and helm.

Firstly, delete the cert-manager installation using helm. Ensure the --purge flag is applied if you are using Helm 2.

# Helm 3
$ helm --namespace cert-manager delete cert-manager

# Helm 2.x
$ helm delete cert-manager --purge

Next, delete the cert-manager namespace:

$ kubectl delete namespace cert-manager

Finally, delete the cert-manager CustomResourceDefinitions using the link to the version vX.Y.Z you installed:

$ kubectl delete -f https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/releases/download/vX.Y.Z/cert-manager.crds.yaml

Namespace Stuck in Terminating State

If the namespace has been marked for deletion without deleting the cert-manager installation first, the namespace may become stuck in a terminating state. This is typically due to the fact that the APIService resource still exists however the webhook is no longer running so is no longer reachable. To resolve this, ensure you have run the above commands correctly, and if you're still experiencing issues then run:

$ kubectl delete apiservice v1beta1.webhook.cert-manager.io