Documentation
paasbox is a managed Kubernetes platform for your own Hetzner Cloud account. The platform provisions and operates the control plane; you bring your own Hetzner nodes — and keep your grandfathered pricing. These docs explain how it works, what’s yours versus ours, how the pricing math plays out, and the answers to the questions people ask first.
Start here
Section titled “Start here”QuickstartYour first cluster in ~10 minutes: sign up, connect a Hetzner token, compose, start, kubectl get nodes.
How paasbox worksThe Garden / Seed / Shoot model, who runs what, and the path from sign-up to a running cluster with a kubeconfig in your hands.
What you bring & what we runThe exact split of responsibility and cost — your nodes in your Hetzner project, your control plane operated by the platform.
From token to clusterWhat happens after you connect your Hetzner API token — the provisioning timeline, what appears in your project, and the three optional topologies.
Clusters & node pools
Section titled “Clusters & node pools”Node poolsManaged pools are cattle — resize, scale to zero. Pooled pools are pets — your grandfathered servers, never deleted. How they behave and mix.
Adopt your serversBring pre-increase servers in as worker nodes: wiped and reinstalled in place, never deleted, price preserved. The flagship.
HibernationPut a cluster to sleep: worker spend stops, the hourly meter drops to €0, state survives, wake in minutes.
Regionsnbg1 is live, fsn1 and hel1 open at demand. What a region determines, and how to pick one with grandfathered servers.
Access & identity
Section titled “Access & identity”Access your clusterShort-lived admin kubeconfigs from the console or the API — how they work, using them in CI, and what they do (and don't) include.
Bring your own identity providerLog in with your own OIDC IdP — named users, group-based RBAC, MFA, and instant offboarding.
Teams & API keysTeams own everything — roles, invitations, scoped API keys for CI, and the audited activity log.
Security & trustToken custody, the single write path, what we can and cannot see, EU data location, and responsible disclosure.
Backups & availabilityContinuous etcd backups, what HA actually changes, and why a control-plane pause doesn't stop your apps.
Billing
Section titled “Billing”Pricing & billingTwo tiers per cluster — Basic €49/$65, HA €99/$129, annual and hourly plans. What's included, what Hetzner bills directly, spend caps, and fair use.
Grandfathered pricing, explainedWhy normal Kubernetes loses your old Hetzner rate, how paasbox keeps it, and what that's worth per month.
Billing & spend controlsThe €5 signup credit, the awake-hours meter, spend caps that hibernate instead of delete, dunning, and cancellation.