# rpk cluster partitions balance

> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.redpanda.com/llms.txt). Component-specific: [streaming-full.txt](https://docs.redpanda.com/streaming-full.txt)

---
title: rpk cluster partitions balance
latest-redpanda-tag: v25.3.11
latest-console-tag: v3.7.3
latest-operator-version: v26.1.4
# EOL = End-of-Life (support lifecycle status)
page-is-nearing-eol: "false"
page-is-past-eol: "false"
page-eol-date: November 19, 2026
latest-connect-version: 4.93.0
docname: rpk/rpk-cluster/rpk-cluster-partitions-balance
page-component-name: streaming
page-version: "25.3"
page-component-version: "25.3"
page-component-title: Streaming
page-relative-src-path: rpk/rpk-cluster/rpk-cluster-partitions-balance.adoc
page-edit-url: https://github.com/redpanda-data/docs/edit/v/25.3/modules/reference/pages/rpk/rpk-cluster/rpk-cluster-partitions-balance.adoc
description: rpk cluster partitions balance
page-git-created-date: "2024-09-21"
page-git-modified-date: "2024-09-21"
support-status: supported
---

<!-- Source: https://docs.redpanda.com/streaming/25.3/reference/rpk/rpk-cluster/rpk-cluster-partitions-balance.md -->

Triggers on-demand partition balancing.

With Redpanda Community Edition, the partition count on each broker can easily become uneven, which leads to data skewing. To distribute partitions across brokers, you can run this command to trigger on-demand partition balancing.

With Redpanda Enterprise Edition, Continuous Data Balancing monitors broker and rack availability, as well as disk usage, to avoid topic hotspots. However, there are edge cases where users should manually trigger partition balancing (such as a node becoming unavailable for a prolonged time and rejoining the cluster thereafter). In such cases, you should run this command to trigger partition balancing manually.

After you run this command, monitor the balancer progress using:

```bash
rpk cluster partitions balancer-status
```

To see more detailed movement status, monitor the progress using:

```bash
rpk cluster partitions move-status
```

## [](#usage)Usage

```bash
rpk cluster partitions balance [flags]
```

## [](#flags)Flags

| Value | Type | Description |
| --- | --- | --- |
| -h, --help | - | Help for balance. |
| --config | string | Redpanda or rpk config file; default search paths are /var/lib/redpanda/.config/rpk/rpk.yaml, $PWD/redpanda.yaml, and /etc/redpanda/redpanda.yaml. |
| -X, --config-opt | stringArray | Override rpk configuration settings. See rpk -X or execute rpk -X help for inline detail or rpk -X list for terser detail. |
| --profile | string | Profile to use. See rpk profile for more details. |
| -v, --verbose | - | Enable verbose logging. |