Lens Release

Introducing Lens Prism: Your AI-Powered Kubernetes Copilot

AI is changing everything—and Kubernetes is no exception.

Kubernetes is entering a new era—one where clusters can be explored and understood through natural conversation, not arcane commands. As the world’s most popular IDE for Kubernetes, Lens is leading this transformation: from command lines to conversations, from fragmented tools to unified intelligence.

In this release, Lens embraces that shift—transforming the way developers, operators, and teams interact with their infrastructure. We’re introducing two powerful new capabilities that make Lens not just more advanced, but radically more intuitive:

  • Lens Prism – your AI-powered Kubernetes copilot, built into the Lens IDE
  • One-Click AWS Integration – connect to all your EKS clusters instantly, no CLI or config required

Whether you're a developer, DevOps engineer, SRE, or platform team lead, this release gives you:

  • A faster way to troubleshoot clusters and workloads without memorizing kubectl
  • One-click onboarding for AWS environments with automatic cluster discovery
  • Secure, context-aware AI assistance embedded in your IDE

Unlike generic AI tools or command-line-based assistants, Lens Prism works where you work—inside your cluster UI. It’s fully aware of your current context and powered by live data, delivering insights that are grounded in what you’re actually looking at.

Lens Prism – Talk to Your Cluster

Lens Prism is a context-aware AI assistant, built directly into Lens Desktop. It lets you interact with your live Kubernetes clusters using natural language—no memorized syntax, no tool-hopping, no copy pasting. By understanding your current context inside Lens, Prism translates plain language questions into diagnostics and returns live, actionable answers. This is just the beginning—Lens Prism’s initial release lays the foundation for an even more powerful AI experience that will continue to evolve with each update.

Whether you're troubleshooting a failing pod or checking resource usage across namespaces, Lens Prism acts like a real-time Kubernetes expert anyone on your team can access—even those who don’t live in kubectl every day. It goes beyond simple chat by running actual kubectl commands behind the scenes, scoped to your active cluster. It remembers your history, understands which view you're in, and supports follow-up questions to help you drill deeper into issues.

All of this happens securely—your data stays local by default. Lens Prism connects directly to any OpenAI-compatible LLM—whether it's hosted in the cloud or deployed in your own environment. This direct connection also makes it possible to run Prism in airgapped setups. More than just a chatbot, Lens Prism represents the next step in making Kubernetes more accessible, intuitive, and productive for everyone.

Ask Questions, Not Commands

Lens Prism lets you interact with your cluster using natural language—not command syntax. Instead of memorizing flags and searching logs manually, you can simply ask:

“What’s wrong with my pod?”
“How much CPU is each node using?”
“Investigate frontend deployment logs for any issues.”

You can even ask broader, open-ended questions like:

“Is there anything wrong with my cluster?”
“How can I improve the performance of my backend workload?”

Prism handles diagnostics for you—clearly and concisely—so you can skip the guesswork, scripting, and log spelunking.

Real-Time, Context-Aware Intelligence

Lens Prism doesn’t just answer questions—it understands the state of your environment in real time and responds with precise, context-rich insights. It makes Kubernetes instantly more accessible and powerful. It’s like having an SRE built into every developer’s IDE — without adding risk, complexity, or new tools.

What sets Prism apart isn’t just that it runs inside your IDE. It actively leverages:

  • Live kubectl queries scoped to your active cluster and namespace
  • Metrics from Prometheus for resource usage and performance signals
  • Logs from running workloads for real-time diagnostics
  • The view you're currently in within Lens Desktop
  • Multi-turn memory for intelligent follow-ups and refinements

Prism delivers accurate, environment-specific answers based on the real state of your infrastructure—not from static documentation or generic assumptions.

And all of this happens seamlessly, without switching tabs, pasting commands, or breaking focus. No plugins. No browser. Just answers, where and when you need them.

Built for Security: Respects Kubernetes RBAC

With Lens Prism, AI doesn’t bypass your guardrails. It works within them.

Unlike many Kubernetes AI assistants that run privileged agents inside your cluster, Lens Prism operates entirely through your existing user context.

When you ask a question, Lens Prism runs diagnostics using your personal kubeconfig — just like if you were typing kubectl yourself. That means:

  • Prism never has more access than you do.
  • Every action respects your current RBAC permissions.
  • There’s no elevated cluster-side component or backend service with admin-level access.

This approach ensures RBAC alignment by design. It makes Prism safe for non-admin users, easy to adopt across teams, and a perfect fit for enterprise environments where least privilege and zero trust are more than buzzwords—they’re requirements.

One-Click AWS Integration – Instant EKS Cluster Access Without the Complexity

Lens already makes working with Kubernetes clusters easier. Now, we’re removing one of the biggest roadblocks in the onboarding journey: connecting to your AWS EKS clusters.

Previously, Lens supported AWS integration by leveraging the AWS CLI and credential chain installed on your local machine. While functional, this approach was brittle—many users didn’t have the required toolchain installed, and setting it up was often error-prone and time-consuming.

With One-Click AWS Integration, we’ve eliminated that friction entirely. With this update, authentication takes place directly inside the app—you can automatically discover all your EKS clusters across accounts and regions, and connect to them with a single click. No AWS CLI setup. No manual credentials. No terminal gymnastics.

For Developers

Developers can now bypass complex CLI setups and start interacting with real clusters in minutes. This reduces time-to-value for new users and eliminates the frustration of environment setup. It’s especially powerful when paired with Lens Prism—letting you immediately explore and debug clusters the moment you connect.

For IT & Enterprise Teams

One-Click AWS Integration standardizes how teams connect to AWS infrastructure, improves security by reducing the reliance on local credentials, and reduces support burden from setup-related issues. Authentication options align with enterprise standards and upcoming updates will support additional SSO flows and identity management.

Availability & Pricing

All new features announced in this release—Lens Prism and One-Click AWS Integration—are available now to all Lens Premium plan users (Plus, Pro, and Enterprise) at no additional cost.

  • If you're already on a Premium plan, just update to the latest version of Lens Desktop and start using them right away.
  • If you’re not on a Premium plan yet, this is the perfect time to upgrade and unlock the full power of Lens: See Lens Plans & Pricing.

What’s Next?

This release is just the beginning. Lens Prism will keep getting smarter, more connected, and more capable—making Lens even easier and more powerful to use.

  • Improved AI Reasoning & Skills – Lens Prism is learning fast. We're continuously expanding its ability to diagnose problems, understand complex patterns, and assist with advanced troubleshooting—making it more valuable with every release.
  • Deeper Integration Across Lens – See a warning in your cluster view? You’ll soon be able to summon Lens Prism right from that UI context—getting instant diagnosis and next steps. The assistant is becoming more proactive and deeply woven into your workflow.
  • Model Context Protocol (MCP) Support – Lens Prism will be able to tap into additional data sources and signals across your stack using the Model Context Protocol. That means richer insights, smarter responses, and broader context for every question.
  • Expanded AWS Authentication Options – We’re extending AWS support to include more authentication methods and SSO workflows, making access easier, faster, and more secure.
  • Azure Integration Coming Soon – We’re bringing the same one-click cluster discovery and connectivity to AKS on Azure—making Lens even more versatile for cloud-native teams.

Lens is evolving into a truly intelligent platform for Kubernetes development and operations. And this release is just the first step.

Get Started Today

Existing Lens users will receive a notification when an update is available—simply click to update and you’ll be on the latest version. New users can download Lens directly from our website. The update to existing users is rolling out in phases, so if you don’t see the update yet, you can manually download the latest version to get started right away.

We’d love to hear what you think. Your feedback directly shapes the future of Lens. Join the conversation in the Lens community forums, or file an issue if you encounter a bug. We hope you enjoy this new experience. Try it out, share your feedback, and stay tuned—this is just the beginning.