<p>What's the suggested way to update the cluster version from 1.2 to 1.3?</p>

<p>Is there a structured way to do it or I have to create a new cluster from scratch?</p>

<p>Couldn't find any documentation regarding this.</p>

<p>The answer partially depends on how you set up your cluster in the first place. If you used the <code>kube-up.sh</code> script with the environment set to <code>AWS</code>, then they don't currently provide an upgrade mechanism. If you used <a href="https://github.com/kubernetes/kops" rel="nofollow">kops</a> then you can use the built in <code>upgrade</code> command. </p>

<p>The reason that I said "partially" above is that many Kubernetes users have found it easier to lift and shift rather than upgrade in place when they are running on cloud infrastructure. The idea is that cluster deployment is a more well tested code path than cluster upgrades (especially on AWS). So you'd deploy a second cluster, re-provision your applications and services, shift your traffic from your existing cluster to your new cluster, and then delete your old cluster. </p>

<p>Once you have this strategy working, you can do it to shift to any desired cluster software version (upgrade or downgrade), and depending on the mechanism you use to shift traffic, you can also move across zones, regions, or even cloud providers. </p>
