A node pool is a group of nodes with the same configuration within a cluster.
Each node within the node pool has a Kubernetes node label which is the node pool’s name. The node pool may be resized up or down to accommodate workloads.
All the worker nodes within a node pool have identical resources, but each node pool can have a different worker configuration. This lets you have different services on different node pools, where each pool has the RAM, CPU, and attached storage resources the service requires.
You can create and modify node pools at any time. Worker nodes are automatically deleted and recreated when needed, and you can manually recycle worker nodes. Nodes in the node pool will inherit the node pool’s naming scheme when you first create a node pool, however, renaming a node pool will not rename the nodes. Nodes inherit the new naming scheme when recycled or when resizing the node pool which creates new nodes.
You can add custom tags to a cluster and its node pools. DOKS deletes any custom tags you added to worker nodes in a node pool (for example, from the Droplets page) to maintain consistency between the node pool and its worker nodes.