> Basically, Horizontal Pod Autoscaler but with sensors which are not just "CPU"

Since Kubernetes 1.23, there's support for using "custom metrics" to control HPAs: https://kubernetes.io/blog/2026/07/14/custom-metrics-exporte...

Is it somewhat convoluted to setup? Absolutely! But it's possible to use relatively robust and well supported built in controllers with custom metrics.

> Is it somewhat convoluted to setup? Absolutely!

Kubernetes™

The node equivalent, also very useful for engineering cost effective cloud environments, is called KEDA.