Node Pool - CI/CD Glossary Definition

A node pool is a set of identically configured nodes, so you can dedicate hardware types to specific workloads.

A node pool is a group of nodes within a cluster that share the same configuration (machine type, labels, and settings), letting you run different workloads on tailored hardware.

CI build workloads and production services often live in different node pools. This separation lets you put burstable build jobs on cheaper or spot capacity.

Use in CI

Teams often run self-hosted runners or build jobs in a dedicated node pool backed by spot nodes, isolating cost-sensitive CI compute from latency-sensitive production pods.

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