ArgoCD Cheat Sheet

GitOps continuous delivery for Kubernetes: Application CRD syntax, sync policies, App of Apps pattern, and CLI commands.

3 PagesIntermediateJan 26, 2026

Application Custom Resource

Declares what Git source syncs to which cluster/namespace, with automated sync policy.

yaml

apiVersion: argoproj.io/v1alpha1kind: Applicationmetadata:  name: guestbook  namespace: argocdspec:  project: default  source:    repoURL: https://github.com/org/guestbook.git    targetRevision: main    path: k8s/overlays/production  destination:    server: https://kubernetes.default.svc    namespace: guestbook  syncPolicy:    automated:      prune: true      # delete resources removed from Git      selfHeal: true    # revert manual cluster drift    syncOptions:      - CreateNamespace=true

ArgoCD CLI Essentials

bash

argocd login argocd.example.com --ssoargocd app listargocd app get guestbookargocd app sync guestbookargocd app sync guestbook --pruneargocd app diff guestbook               # show drift vs Gitargocd app rollback guestbook 4         # roll back to history ID 4argocd app set guestbook --sync-policy automated

App of Apps Pattern

A root Application that manages a set of child Applications, giving one Git source of truth for the whole cluster.

yaml

apiVersion: argoproj.io/v1alpha1kind: Applicationmetadata:  name: root-app  namespace: argocdspec:  project: default  source:    repoURL: https://github.com/org/gitops-config.git    targetRevision: main    path: apps               # directory containing one YAML per child Application  destination:    server: https://kubernetes.default.svc    namespace: argocd  syncPolicy:    automated:      prune: true      selfHeal: true

AppProject for Multi-Tenancy

Restrict which repos/clusters/resource kinds a team's Applications can use.

yaml

apiVersion: argoproj.io/v1alpha1kind: AppProjectmetadata:  name: team-payments  namespace: argocdspec:  sourceRepos:    - 'https://github.com/org/payments-*'  destinations:    - namespace: 'payments-*'      server: https://kubernetes.default.svc  clusterResourceWhitelist:    - group: ''      kind: Namespace

Core Concepts & Sync States

Terms you'll see constantly in the UI/CLI.

Application- the CRD tying a Git source to a cluster destination
Synced / OutOfSync- whether live cluster state matches the Git-declared state
Healthy / Degraded / Progressing- health status computed from resource-specific health checks
prune- delete live resources no longer present in Git during sync
selfHeal- automatically re-sync when someone manually edits a resource (drift correction)
ApplicationSet- generates many Applications from a template (e.g. one per cluster or per Git directory)

Pro Tip

Turn on `selfHeal` only after you trust your Git source completely — in early adoption it's safer to run automated sync with `selfHeal: false` first so a bad manual hotfix doesn't get silently reverted mid-incident before the team has adjusted its habits.

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