---
title: Deploy a sample application
description: Deploy the Bookinfo sample application.
weight: 2
owner: istio/wg-networking-maintainers
test: yes
prev: /docs/ambient/getting-started
---

To explore Istio, you will install the sample [Bookinfo application](/docs/examples/bookinfo/), composed of four separate microservices used to demonstrate various Istio features.

{{< image width="50%" link="./bookinfo.svg" caption="Istio's Bookinfo sample application is written in many different languages" >}}

As part of this guide, you'll deploy the Bookinfo application and expose the `productpage` service using an ingress gateway.

## Deploy the Bookinfo application

Start by deploying the application:

{{< text bash >}}
$ kubectl apply -f @samples/bookinfo/platform/kube/bookinfo.yaml@
$ kubectl apply -f @samples/bookinfo/platform/kube/bookinfo-versions.yaml@
{{< /text >}}

To verify that the application is running, check the status of the pods:

{{< text syntax=bash snip_id=none >}}
$ kubectl get pods
NAME                             READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
details-v1-cf74bb974-nw94k       1/1     Running   0          42s
productpage-v1-87d54dd59-wl7qf   1/1     Running   0          42s
ratings-v1-7c4bbf97db-rwkw5      1/1     Running   0          42s
reviews-v1-5fd6d4f8f8-66j45      1/1     Running   0          42s
reviews-v2-6f9b55c5db-6ts96      1/1     Running   0          42s
reviews-v3-7d99fd7978-dm6mx      1/1     Running   0          42s
{{< /text >}}

To access the `productpage` service from outside the cluster, you need to configure an ingress gateway.

## Deploy and configure the ingress gateway

You will use the Kubernetes Gateway API to deploy a gateway called `bookinfo-gateway`:

{{< text syntax=bash snip_id=deploy_bookinfo_gateway >}}
$ kubectl apply -f @samples/bookinfo/gateway-api/bookinfo-gateway.yaml@
{{< /text >}}

By default, Istio creates a `LoadBalancer` service for a gateway. As you will access this gateway by a tunnel, you don't need a load balancer. Change the service type to `ClusterIP` by annotating the gateway:

{{< text syntax=bash snip_id=annotate_bookinfo_gateway >}}
$ kubectl annotate gateway bookinfo-gateway networking.istio.io/service-type=ClusterIP --namespace=default
{{< /text >}}

To check the status of the gateway, run:

{{< text bash >}}
$ kubectl get gateway
NAME               CLASS   ADDRESS                                            PROGRAMMED   AGE
bookinfo-gateway   istio   bookinfo-gateway-istio.default.svc.cluster.local   True         42s
{{< /text >}}

Wait for the gateway to show as programmed before continuing.

## Access the application

You will connect to the Bookinfo `productpage` service through the gateway you just provisioned. To access the gateway, you need to use the `kubectl port-forward` command:

{{< text syntax=bash snip_id=none >}}
$ kubectl port-forward svc/bookinfo-gateway-istio 8080:80
{{< /text >}}

Open your browser and navigate to `http://localhost:8080/productpage` to view the Bookinfo application.

{{< image width="80%" link="./bookinfo-browser.png" caption="Bookinfo Application" >}}

If you refresh the page, you should see the display of the book ratings changing as the requests are distributed across the different versions of the `reviews` service.

## Next steps

[Continue to the next section](../secure-and-visualize/) to add the application to the mesh, and learn how to secure and visualize the communication between the applications.