Helm — cheat sheet¶

A one-page lookup for the commands and flags used across this course. Grouped by task; the course page covers the why behind each one — this page is just the what.

Repos & registries¶

Task	Command
Add a chart repo	`helm repo add NAME URL`
Refresh repo indexes	`helm repo update`
Log in to an OCI registry	`helm registry login REGISTRY`

Inspect (read-only)¶

Task	Command
Search a repo	`helm search repo TERM`
Show a chart's `Chart.yaml`	`helm show chart REPO/CHART`
Show a chart's default values	`helm show values REPO/CHART`
Show everything (chart + values + README)	`helm show all REPO/CHART`
Render templates without installing	`helm template RELEASE CHART -f values.yaml`

Install / upgrade¶

Task	Command
Install	`helm install RELEASE CHART -n NS --create-namespace -f overrides.yaml`
Install or upgrade in one step	`helm upgrade --install RELEASE CHART -n NS -f overrides.yaml --atomic --wait`
Validate without applying	`helm install RELEASE CHART --dry-run --debug`
Override a single value	`--set key=value` (repeatable; last `--set`/`-f` wins)

Flags worth memorising¶

Flag	What it does
`--atomic`	If the install/upgrade fails partway, uninstall/roll back everything it touched — safer default in CI
`--wait`	Block until every resource reports ready; critical for chained installs
`--dry-run --debug`	Render + validate against the cluster without applying anything
`--create-namespace`	Create the target namespace if it doesn't exist
`-f` / `--values`	Layer a values file on top of the chart's defaults (repeatable, later wins)
`--strict`	(with `lint`) fail on warnings, not just errors

Releases¶

Task	Command
List releases	`helm list -A`
Show a release's status	`helm status RELEASE -n NS`
Show the values a release actually used	`helm get values RELEASE -n NS`
Show the rendered manifests a release applied	`helm get manifest RELEASE -n NS`
Show revision history	`helm history RELEASE -n NS`
Roll back to a prior revision	`helm rollback RELEASE REVISION -n NS --wait --atomic`
Uninstall	`helm uninstall RELEASE -n NS`
Uninstall but keep the name reserved	`helm uninstall RELEASE -n NS --keep-history`
Run the chart's test hooks	`helm test RELEASE -n NS`

Authoring¶

Task	Command
Scaffold a new chart	`helm create NAME`
Lint a chart	`helm lint ./NAME --strict`
Package a chart into a `.tgz`	`helm package ./NAME --version X.Y.Z`
Push a packaged chart to an OCI registry	`helm push NAME-X.Y.Z.tgz oci://REGISTRY/PATH`
Pull in subchart dependencies	`helm dependency update ./NAME` / `helm dependency build ./NAME`

Debug¶

Task	Command
Dump everything about a release	`helm get all RELEASE -n NS`
Surface template render errors with file:line	`helm template RELEASE CHART --debug 2>&1 \\| less`
Validate an install before it touches the cluster	`helm install --dry-run --debug RELEASE CHART`

How this connects¶

The Kubernetes reference pages cover what this chart's templates actually render into (workloads, networking), and the Helmfile course covers orchestrating many releases across environments on top of these same commands.