Expose a Service in one cluster to another cluster (cross-cluster connectivity)

Last validated: Jan 5, 2026

You can use the Tailscale Kubernetes Operator to expose a Service in one cluster to another cluster. This is done by exposing the Service on destination cluster A to the tailnet ( cluster ingress), and connecting from a source Service in cluster B to the tailnet ( cluster egress) to access the Service running in cluster A.

For GitOps workflows that need to manage deployments across multiple clusters, refer to Manage multi-cluster Kubernetes deployments with ArgoCD. To distribute secrets between clusters, refer to Sync Kubernetes secrets across clusters with External Secrets Operator.

Prerequisites

Set up the Kubernetes Operator.

Cross-cluster connectivity setup

This will need to be configured for each Ingress and Egress pair of Services. To set this up for access through ingress to a Service in cluster A and routing through egress from a Service in cluster B:

Set up Ingress in cluster A for the Service you wish to access.
Expose the external Service (running in cluster A) using its Tailscale IP address in cluster B with an annotation on the external Service.

Customization

Customize the operator and resources it manages.

Troubleshooting

Troubleshoot the operator and resources it manages.

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