Freelens

Freelens is a free and open-source user interface designed for managing Kubernetes clusters. It provides a standalone application compatible with macOS, Windows, and Linux operating systems, making it accessible to a wide range of users. The application aims to simplify the complexities of Kubernetes management by offering an intuitive and user-friendly interface.

Downloads

See the releases page and download the right package for your system.

macOS

Download either the PKG (installer) or DMG (image) package from the releases page. Both arm64 (M1 chip or newer) and amd64 (Intel) variants are available.

All binary packages are built on macOS 14 and should be compatible with newer systems.

Homebrew

Run the following command:

brew tap freelensapp/tap
brew install --cask freelens

Linux

Download DEB or RPM (package) or AppImage (executable) from the releases page. Both arm64 (aarch64) and amd64 (x86_64) variants are available.

All binary packages are built on Ubuntu 20.04 and should be compatible with new systems.

AppImage

The Linux AppImage file requires libz.so and libfuse.so.2. You can add them by running:

sudo ln -fs /usr/lib/*/libz.so.1 /usr/local/lib/libz.so
sudo ldconfig
sudo apt install libfuse2

Run the application with additional arguments:

./Freelens*.AppImage --no-sandbox --ozone-platform-hint=auto

Flatpak

The package is available on the Flathub App Store for Linux.

Run the following commands:

flatpak install flathub app.freelens.Freelens
flatpak run app.freelens.Freelens

The application is sandboxed. It includes bundled kubectl and helm commands and uses the ~/.kube/config file by default. The ~/.freelens directory is stored in the sandbox.

Flatpak adds wrappers for the aws, gke-gcloud-auth-plugin, and kubelogin tools, running them as commands from the host system.

The terminal uses /bin/sh by default, but it can be switched in the settings to, for example, /bin/bash for a sandboxed environment or /app/bin/host-spawn for a host environment.

APT repository

Run the following commands:

curl -L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/freelensapp/freelens/refs/heads/main/freelens/build/apt/freelens.asc | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/freelens.asc
curl -L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/freelensapp/freelens/refs/heads/main/freelens/build/apt/freelens.sources | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/freelens.sources
sudo apt update
sudo apt install freelens

Windows

Download the EXE or MSI installers from the releases page.

The EXE and MSI are not yet signed, so you must override Microsoft Defender SmartScreen to install them.

Only the x64 (amd64) version of the Windows binaries is provided.

WinGet

The package is available in WinGet Community repository.

Run the following command:

winget install Freelensapp.Freelens

The --silent option is supported to suppress all UI.

Node-Pod-Menu extension

To view container logs and shell into them and nodes, you can install the freelens-node-pod-menu extension.

To install it, open the Freelens -> Extensions menu, enter the name @freelensapp/freelens-node-pod-menu as input, and click the Install button.

Development

Read DEVELOPMENT.md to see how to build the application from source.

Contributing

Anyone is welcome to collaborate to advance the Freelens project. Read CONTRIBUTING.md to see how you can help.

License

This repository is a fork of Open Lens, the core of Lens Desktop, with the aim of carrying forward its open-source version.

Copyright (c) 2024-2025 Freelens Authors.

Copyright (c) 2022 OpenLens Authors.

MIT License