CKA Troubleshooting Practice Question
You have a pod that is in 'Pending' state because it requires a PersistentVolumeClaim that is not bound. Which event would you see in 'kubectl describe pod'?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently confuse 'Pending' state causes—such as resource shortages or node selector mismatches—with the specific PVC binding failure, which produces a unique scheduler event message that is explicitly listed in 'kubectl describe pod' output.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
0/1 nodes are available: 1 pod has unbound immediate PersistentVolumeClaims
When a pod is in 'Pending' state due to an unbound PersistentVolumeClaim (PVC), the scheduler cannot place the pod until the PVC is bound to a PersistentVolume (PV). The event message '0/1 nodes are available: 1 pod has unbound immediate PersistentVolumeClaims' is generated by the Kubernetes scheduler when it evaluates the pod's PVC requirement and finds no matching PV that satisfies the claim's storage class, access modes, and size, causing the pod to remain unscheduled.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
0/1 nodes are available: 1 node(s) didn't match node selector
Why it's wrong here
This scheduling failure occurs when a Pod specifies a nodeSelector or nodeAffinity in its spec, but none of the active nodes in the cluster possess the matching labels. While this keeps the Pod in a Pending state, it is entirely unrelated to storage provisioning or unbound PersistentVolumeClaims.
- ✗
Failed to pull image "myimage:latest"
Why it's wrong here
This error is emitted by the kubelet during the container creation phase, typically resulting in an ImagePullBackOff or ErrImagePull status rather than keeping the Pod stuck in the scheduler's Pending state. It points to registry authentication issues, network failures, or an incorrect image name, rather than storage binding problems.
- ✗
0/1 nodes are available: 1 Insufficient memory
Why it's wrong here
This event is generated by the kube-scheduler when the aggregate memory requests of the Pod's containers exceed the allocatable memory capacity of the available nodes. It indicates a compute resource constraint rather than a storage issue, meaning the scheduler cannot find a node with sufficient free RAM to host the Pod.
- ✓
0/1 nodes are available: 1 pod has unbound immediate PersistentVolumeClaims
Why this is correct
This is the exact event message emitted by the kube-scheduler when a Pod references a PersistentVolumeClaim that uses the Immediate volume binding mode but has not yet been bound to a PersistentVolume. The scheduler cannot place the Pod on a node until the underlying storage is successfully provisioned and bound to satisfy the Pod's volume requirements.
Quick reference
AWS S3 Storage Class Comparison
| Storage Class | Min Duration | Retrieval | Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| S3 Standard | None | Immediate | Frequently accessed data |
| S3 Standard-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Infrequent access, rapid retrieval |
| S3 One Zone-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Non-critical infrequent data |
| S3 Intelligent-Tiering | None | Immediate–hours | Unknown or changing access patterns |
| S3 Glacier Instant | 90 days | Milliseconds | Archive with instant retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Flexible | 90 days | Minutes–hours | Archive, flexible retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Deep Archive | 180 days | Hours | Long-term compliance archive |
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Installing Kubernetes with kubeadm
Key term
Persistent Volumes
A Persistent Volume is a piece of storage in a Kubernetes cluster that has been provisioned by an administrator and exists independently of any single pod that uses it.
Key term
Storage Classes
A Storage Class in Kubernetes is a template that defines how persistent storage is provisioned automatically, including the type of storage, performance characteristics, and provisioning policies.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This CKA practice question is part of Courseiva's free CNCF certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CKA exam.