Example metadata-only client usage

metadata_only_client.go

var (
  ctx     context.Context
  c       client.Client                         // "sigs.k8s.io/controller-runtime/pkg/client"
  podList = &metav1.PartialObjectMetadataList{} // "k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/apis/meta/v1"
)
podList.SetGroupVersionKind(corev1.SchemeGroupVersion.WithKind("PodList")) // "k8s.io/api/core/v1"

if err := c.List(ctx, podList, client.InNamespace("my-namespace"), client.Limit(1)); err != nil {
  return err
}

if len(podList.Items) > 0 {
  // namespace contains at least one pod
} else {
  // namespace doesn't contain any pods
}