Install Percona Operator for MongoDB in multi-namespace (cluster-wide) mode

This document walks you through installing the Operator and Percona Server for MongoDB in multi-namespace (cluster-wide) mode with default parameters.

To learn more about available deployment modes, see Single-namespace and multi-namespace deployment modes.

To install Percona Operator for MongoDB with custom parameters, see Install Percona Operator for MongoDB with custom parameters.

To install the Operator cluster-wide, use the YAML files in the deploy folder with the cw- prefix, such as deploy/cw-bundle.yaml.

Key configuration steps:

Edit the Operator deployment section of the deploy/cw-bundle.yaml and specify the following:

• Set subjects.namespace to the namespace where the Operator will run.
• In the env section, set WATCH_NAMESPACE to a comma-separated list of namespaces you want the Operator to watch.
• To watch all namespaces, set WATCH_NAMESPACE to an empty string (“”).

Below is a streamlined example for cluster-wide setup on Kubernetes:

1. Clone the percona-server-mongodb-operator repository:

   git clone -b v1.23.1 https://github.com/percona/percona-server-mongodb-operator
   cd percona-server-mongodb-operator
   

2. Create the namespaces: one for the Operator and another one for the database cluster:

   kubectl create namespace psmdb-operator
   kubectl create namespace psmdb  # Namespace to be watched by the Operator
   

3. Edit deploy/cw-bundle.yaml and set the namespaces accordingly:

   ...
   subjects:
   - kind: ServiceAccount
     name: percona-server-mongodb-operator
     namespace: "psmdb-operator"
   ...
   env:
     - name: WATCH_NAMESPACE
       value: "psmdb"
   

4. Apply the cluster-wide bundle:

   kubectl apply -f deploy/cw-bundle.yaml --server-side -n psmdb-operator
   

   This creates Custom Resource Definitions, role-based access control, clusterrolebindings and the Operator Deployment.

5. Verify the Deployment:

   kubectl get deploy -n psmdb-operator
   

6. Once the Operator is running, create a MongoDB cluster:

   kubectl apply -f deploy/cr.yaml -n psmdb
   

7. Check the cluster’s status:

   kubectl get psmdb -n psmdb
   

   Expected output

   NAME              ENDPOINT                                         STATUS   AGE
   my-cluster-name   my-cluster-name-mongos.psmdb.svc.cluster.local   ready    5m26s
   

Next steps

Verify the cluster operation

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Last update: September 17, 2026
Created: September 15, 2022