--- title: "Video: Everything You Need to Know about Kubernetes Services Networking in Your Rancher Cluster" source: "https://www.tigera.io/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-kubernetes-services-networking-2/" description: "Calico utilizes Kubernetes Services, an abstraction layer which defines a logical set of pods and enables load balancing and service discovery for those pods." --- [Technical Blog](https://www.tigera.io/category/technical-blog/) # Video: Everything You Need to Know about Kubernetes Services Networking in Your Rancher Cluster By [John Armstrong](https://www.tigera.io/blog/author/john-armstrong/) on Jun 01, 2020 • 3 min read As a leading, open-source multi-cluster orchestration platform, [Rancher](http://rancher.com/) lets operations teams deploy, manage and secure enterprise Kubernetes. Rancher also gives users a set of [CNI](http://github.com/containernetworking/cni) options to choose from, including open-source [Project Calico](https://www.tigera.io/project-calico/). Calico provides native Layer 3 routing capability for Kubernetes pods which simplifies the networking architecture, increases networking performance and provides a rich network policy model that makes it easy to lock down communication so the only traffic that flows is the traffic you want to flow. Services are one of the key Kubernetes primitives you need to understand to glue microservices together and expose your applications outside of the cluster. The [Service resource](http://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/services-networking/service/) provides an abstract way to expose an application running on a set of pods as a network service. ## Accessing services in a Rancher cluster using Calico Calico provides a range of options for accessing services in a Rancher cluster depending on your needs and the specific cluster environment. For example, you may need to limit access to specific external clients, or you may be running workloads that are latency-sensitive. Understanding how services work in your cluster and the many services options available to you can help you determine the best approach to addressing your specific use cases. Working through this process will raise questions, such as: - What’s the difference between a Cluster IP, Node Port, and Load Balancer service? - How do all these abstractions translate to real under-the-covers networking behavior? - What role does Calico play in services deployment? Here is a short 7-minute video that explains all this and more! In the video you’ll learn: - How pods consume services within the cluster (Cluster IPs) - The different ways a service can be consumed outside of the cluster (Node Ports, Load Balancers, and Service IP advertisement) - What is External Traffic Policy and how does it impact a service? - How Services and Network Policy interact - How all this works under the covers in concrete networking terms - What differences Calico’s native service handling capabilities bring to the picture compared to kube-proxy Happy watching! If you enjoyed this video then you may also like: - [Everything you need to know about Kubernetes Ingress networking](https://www.tigera.io/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-kubernetes-ingress-networking/) - [Everything you need to know about Kubernetes networking on AWS](https://www.tigera.io/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-kubernetes-pod-networking-on-aws/) - [Everything you need to know about Kubernetes networking on Azure](https://www.tigera.io/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-kubernetes-networking-on-azure/) - Free online [training and workshops](https://www.tigera.io/events/) ————————————————- [**Free Online Training**](https://www.tigera.io/events/) Access Live and On-Demand Kubernetes Tutorials [**Calico Enterprise – Free Trial**](https://www.calicocloud.io/home) Solve Common Kubernetes Roadblocks and Advance Your Enterprise Adoption [Open Source](https://www.tigera.io/tags/open-source/)[Partner/Integration](https://www.tigera.io/tags/partner-integration/)[Project Calico](https://www.tigera.io/tags/project-calico/) ## Related posts [![What’s new in Calico: Spring 2026 Release](https://www.tigera.io/app/uploads/2026/06/Whats-New-in-Calico-NEW-TEMPLATE-2026.png)](https://www.tigera.io/blog/whats-new-in-calico-spring-2026-release/) [Company Blog](https://www.tigera.io/category/company-blog/) #### [What’s new in Calico: Spring 2026 Release](https://www.tigera.io/blog/whats-new-in-calico-spring-2026-release/) By [Veronika Smolik](https://www.tigera.io/blog/author/veronika-smolik/) on Jun 2, 2026 Kubernetes has come a long way since its debut in 2014. It’s gone from running a couple of containerized microservices to orchestrating fleets of production workloads spanning everything from AI agents to full scale VMs... [Read more](https://www.tigera.io/blog/whats-new-in-calico-spring-2026-release/) [![Kubernetes Operational Maturity: Secure and Resilient Cluster Federation with Cluster Mesh](https://www.tigera.io/app/uploads/2026/05/Kubernetes-Operational-Maturity-Secure-and-Resilient-Cluster-Federation-with-Cluster-Mesh.png)](https://www.tigera.io/blog/kubernetes-operational-maturity-secure-and-resilient-cluster-federation-with-cluster-mesh/) #### [Kubernetes Operational Maturity: Secure and Resilient Cluster Federation with Cluster Mesh](https://www.tigera.io/blog/kubernetes-operational-maturity-secure-and-resilient-cluster-federation-with-cluster-mesh/) By [Veronika Smolik](https://www.tigera.io/blog/author/veronika-smolik/) on May 25, 2026 Practically no one runs a single Kubernetes cluster in production these days. 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