Introduction

Putting it simply, kftray is a cross-platform tool for managing Kubernetes port forwards with automatic reconnection, UDP support, and team configuration sharing.

Why We Built This

We kept running into the same friction with kubectl port-forward during daily Kubernetes development. The built-in command works fine for one-off TCP connections, but it falls short in a few common scenarios:

kftray solves these by wrapping Kubernetes port forwarding in a managed layer that handles reconnection, protocol bridging, and configuration persistence.

Use Cases

Two Interfaces, One Configuration

kftray comes in two flavors that share the same configuration database:

Both interfaces read from the same SQLite database (~/.kftray/kftray.db), so you can mix and match based on the situation. Check the Desktop Interface and Terminal Interface pages for details.

Usage at a Glance

You define port forwards as JSON configurations:

{
  "service": "api-gateway",
  "namespace": "development",
  "local_port": 8080,
  "remote_port": 80,
  "protocol": "tcp",
  "alias": "gateway"
}

Then enable them through either interface. kftray handles the connection lifecycle — including automatic reconnection when pods restart.

For the full walkthrough, see the Quick Start.