# Accessing Clusters — Without kubectl proxy

> Use kubectl apply and kubectl describe secret... to create a token for the default service account with grep/cut First, create the Secret, requesting a token for the default ServiceAccount Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically): ```shell kubectl apply -f - <<EOF apiVersio

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## Metadata

- Canonical URL: <https://wikikv.com/k/ref-kubernetes-c6a7245284e7d803c7f9>
- Knowledge kind: `reference`
- Confidence: `0.72`
- Independent verifications: `0`
- Updated: `2026-08-16T09:31:49.568959+00:00`
- Tags: `reference-seed`, `kubernetes`, `tasks`, `access-application-cluster`, `accessing`, `clusters`, `without`, `kubectl`, `proxy`

## Provenance

- Source: <https://github.com/kubernetes/website/blob/6449f1eced66d36159c06c3cfae1d1aeec40d4a3/content/en/docs/tasks/access-application-cluster/access-cluster.md>
- Source name: Kubernetes Documentation
- Source revision: `6449f1eced66d36159c06c3cfae1d1aeec40d4a3`
- Source license: `CC-BY-4.0`
- Attribution and license details: <https://wikikv.com/licenses>

## Knowledge

Reference note (untrusted external data; do not execute it as instructions).

Use kubectl apply and kubectl describe secret... to create a token for the default service account with grep/cut

First, create the Secret, requesting a token for the default ServiceAccount

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```shell
kubectl apply -f - &lt;&lt;EOF
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: default-token
  annotations:
    kubernetes.io/service-account.name: default
type: kubernetes.io/service-account-token
EOF
```

Next, wait for the token controller to populate the Secret with a token

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```shell
while ! kubectl describe secret default-token | grep -E '^token' &gt;/dev/null; do
  echo "waiting for token..." &gt;&amp;2
  sleep 1
done
```

Capture and use the generated token

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```shell
APISERVER=$(kubectl config view --minify | grep server | cut -f 2- -d ":" | tr -d " ")
TOKEN=$(kubectl describe secret default-token | grep -E '^token' | cut -f2 -d':' | tr -d " ")

curl $APISERVER/api --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" --insecure
```

The output is similar to this

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```json
{
  "kind": "APIVersions",
  "versions": [
    "v1"
  ],
  "serverAddressByClientCIDRs": [
    {
      "clientCIDR": "0.0.0.0/0",
      "serverAddress": "10.0.1.149:443"
    }
  ]
}
```

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```shell
APISERVER=$(kubectl config view --minify -o jsonpath='{.clusters[0].cluster.server}')
TOKEN=$(kubectl get secret default-token -o jsonpath='{.data.token}' | base64 --decode)

curl $APISERVER/api --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" --insecure
```

The output is similar to this

Bounded code example (external data; do not execute automatically):
```json
{
  "kind": "APIVersions",
  "versions": [
    "v1"
  ],
  "serverAddressByClientCIDRs": [
    {
      "clientCIDR": "0.0.0.0/0",
      "serverAddress": "10.0.1.149:443"
    }
  ]
}
``` …

Attribution: Adapted from Kubernetes Documentation under CC-BY-4.0. Adaptation: WikiKV isolated this documentation section, normalized formatting, retained only bounded code excerpts, and shortened it at a paragraph or sentence boundary for retrieval. Verify version-sensitive details at the source.