diff --git a/.github/workflows/kata-deploy-test.yaml b/.github/workflows/kata-deploy-test.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..c5ec4ad8f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.github/workflows/kata-deploy-test.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+on: issue_comment
+name: test-kata-deploy
+jobs:
+  check_comments:
+    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    steps:
+      - name: Check for Command
+        id: command
+        uses: kata-containers/slash-command-action@v1
+        with:
+          repo-token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
+          command: "test"
+          reaction: "true"
+          reaction-type: "eyes"
+          allow-edits: "false"
+          permission-level: admin
+      - name: verify command arg is kata-deploy
+        run: |
+           echo "The command was '${{ steps.command.outputs.command-name }}' with arguments '${{ steps.command.outputs.command-arguments }}'"
+           [[ ${{ steps.command.outputs.command-arguments}} == "kata-deploy" ]]
+  create-and-test-container:
+    needs: check_comments
+    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    steps:
+      - name: get-PR-ref
+        id: get-PR-ref
+        run: |
+            ref=$(cat $GITHUB_EVENT_PATH | jq -r '.issue.pull_request.url' | sed  's#^.*\/pulls#refs\/pull#' | sed 's#$#\/merge#')
+            echo "reference for PR: " ${ref}
+            echo "##[set-output name=pr-ref;]${ref}"
+      - uses: actions/checkout@v2-beta
+        with:
+          ref: ${{ steps.get-PR-ref.outputs.pr-ref }}
+      - name: build-container-image
+        id: build-container-image
+        run: |
+            PR_SHA=$(git log --format=format:%H -n1)
+            VERSION=$(curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/kata-containers/runtime/master/VERSION)
+            ARTIFACT_URL="https://github.com/kata-containers/runtime/releases/download/${VERSION}/kata-static-${VERSION}-x86_64.tar.xz"
+            wget "${ARTIFACT_URL}" -O ./kata-deploy/kata-static.tar.xz
+            docker build --build-arg KATA_ARTIFACTS=kata-static.tar.xz -t katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:${PR_SHA} ./kata-deploy
+            docker login -u ${{ secrets.DOCKER_USERNAME }} -p ${{ secrets.DOCKER_PASSWORD }}
+            docker push katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:$PR_SHA
+            echo "##[set-output name=pr-sha;]${PR_SHA}"
+      - name: test-kata-deploy-ci-in-aks
+        uses: ./kata-deploy/action
+        with:
+          packaging-sha: ${{ steps.build-container-image.outputs.pr-sha }}
+        env:
+          PKG_SHA: ${{ steps.build-container-image.outputs.pr-sha }}
+          AZ_APPID: ${{ secrets.AZ_APPID }}
+          AZ_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.AZ_PASSWORD }}
+          AZ_SUBSCRIPTION_ID: ${{ secrets.AZ_SUBSCRIPTION_ID }}
+          AZ_TENANT_ID: ${{ secrets.AZ_TENANT_ID }}
diff --git a/kata-deploy/action/action.yaml b/kata-deploy/action/action.yml
similarity index 69%
rename from kata-deploy/action/action.yaml
rename to kata-deploy/action/action.yml
index b894fecaa..38d17d4ea 100644
--- a/kata-deploy/action/action.yaml
+++ b/kata-deploy/action/action.yml
@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 # action.yml
-name: 'kata-deploy'
+name: 'kata-deploy-aks'
 description: 'test Kata container image in AKS'
 inputs:
   packaging-sha:
-    description: 'SHA we are using for pulling packaing manifests'
+    description: 'SHA we are using for pulling packaging manifests'
     required: true
     default: ''
 runs:
diff --git a/kata-deploy/action/setup-aks.sh b/kata-deploy/action/setup-aks.sh
index 1bb30e2ec..41fd076a4 100755
--- a/kata-deploy/action/setup-aks.sh
+++ b/kata-deploy/action/setup-aks.sh
@@ -23,9 +23,7 @@ function die() {
 function destroy_aks() {
     set +x
 
-    export KUBECONFIG="_output/$DNS_PREFIX/kubeconfig/kubeconfig.$LOCATION.json"
-    kubectl describe ds -n kube-system kata-deploy || true
-    kubectl describe ds -n kube-system kata-cleanup || true
+    export KUBECONFIG="$PWD/_output/$DNS_PREFIX/kubeconfig/kubeconfig.$LOCATION.json"
 
     az login --service-principal -u "$AZ_APPID" -p "$AZ_PASSWORD" --tenant "$AZ_TENANT_ID"
     az group delete --name "$DNS_PREFIX" --yes --no-wait
diff --git a/kata-deploy/action/test-kata.sh b/kata-deploy/action/test-kata.sh
index 91d6c8f97..2fa2f226a 100755
--- a/kata-deploy/action/test-kata.sh
+++ b/kata-deploy/action/test-kata.sh
@@ -17,13 +17,13 @@ function die() {
 
 function waitForProcess() {
     wait_time="$1"
-    sleep_time="$2"
-    cmd="$3"
+    cmd="$2"
+    sleep_time=5
+    echo "waiting for process $cmd"
     while [ "$wait_time" -gt 0 ]; do
         if eval "$cmd"; then
             return 0
         else
-            echo "waiting"
             sleep "$sleep_time"
             wait_time=$((wait_time-sleep_time))
         fi
@@ -35,16 +35,16 @@ function waitForProcess() {
 # timeout expires
 function waitForLabelRemoval() {
     wait_time="$1"
-    sleep_time="$2"
+    sleep_time=5
 
+    echo "waiting for kata-runtime label to be removed"
     while [[ "$wait_time" -gt 0 ]]; do
         # if a node is found which matches node-select, the output will include a column for node name,
         # NAME. Let's look for that 
-        if [[ -z $(kubectl get nodes --selector katacontainers.io/kata-runtime | grep NAME) ]]
+        if [[ -z $(kubectl get nodes --selector katacontainers.io/kata-runtime 2>&1 | grep NAME) ]]
         then
             return 0
         else
-            echo "waiting for kata-runtime label to be removed"
             sleep "$sleep_time"
             wait_time=$((wait_time-sleep_time))
         fi
@@ -56,10 +56,8 @@ function waitForLabelRemoval() {
     return 1
 }
 
-
 function run_test() {
-    PKG_SHA=$1
-    YAMLPATH="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/kata-containers/packaging/$PKG_SHA/kata-deploy"
+    YAMLPATH="./kata-deploy"
     echo "verify connectivity with a pod using Kata"
 
     deployment=""
@@ -67,7 +65,6 @@ function run_test() {
     busybox_image="busybox"
     cmd="kubectl get pods | grep $busybox_pod | grep Completed"
     wait_time=120
-    sleep_time=3
 
     configurations=("nginx-deployment-qemu" "nginx-deployment-qemu-virtiofs")
     for deployment in "${configurations[@]}"; do
@@ -83,7 +80,7 @@ function run_test() {
 
       # test pod connectivity:
       kubectl run $busybox_pod --restart=Never --image="$busybox_image" -- wget --timeout=5 "$deployment"
-      waitForProcess "$wait_time" "$sleep_time" "$cmd"
+      waitForProcess "$wait_time" "$cmd"
       kubectl logs "$busybox_pod" | grep "index.html"
       kubectl describe pod "$busybox_pod"
 
@@ -99,12 +96,19 @@ function test_kata() {
     set -x
 
     [[ -z "$PKG_SHA" ]] && die "no PKG_SHA provided"
-    echo "$PKG_SHA"
 
-    #kubectl all the things
-    kubectl get pods,nodes --all-namespaces
+    # This action could be called in two contexts:
+    #  1. Packaging workflows: testing in packaging repository, where we assume yaml/packaging
+    #   bits under test are already part of teh action workspace.
+    #  2. From kata-containers: when creating a release, the appropriate packaging repository is
+    #   not yet part of the workspace, and we will need to clone
+    if [[ ! -d ./kata-deploy ]]; then
+        git clone https://github.com/kata-containers/packaging packaging
+        cd packaging
+        git checkout $PKG_SHA
+    fi
 
-    YAMLPATH="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/kata-containers/packaging/$PKG_SHA/kata-deploy"
+    YAMLPATH="./kata-deploy"
 
     kubectl apply -f "$YAMLPATH/kata-rbac/base/kata-rbac.yaml"
 
@@ -114,17 +118,14 @@ function test_kata() {
 
     kubectl get runtimeclasses
 
-    curl -LO "$YAMLPATH/kata-deploy/base/kata-deploy.yaml"
-    curl -LO "$YAMLPATH/kata-cleanup/base/kata-cleanup.yaml"
-
     # update deployment daemonset to utilize the container under test:
-    sed -i "s#katadocker/kata-deploy#katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:${PKG_SHA}#g" kata-deploy.yaml
-    sed -i "s#katadocker/kata-deploy#katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:${PKG_SHA}#g" kata-cleanup.yaml
+    sed -i "s#katadocker/kata-deploy#katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:${PKG_SHA}#g" $YAMLPATH/kata-deploy/base/kata-deploy.yaml
+    sed -i "s#katadocker/kata-deploy#katadocker/kata-deploy-ci:${PKG_SHA}#g" $YAMLPATH/kata-cleanup/base/kata-cleanup.yaml
 
-    cat kata-deploy.yaml
+    cat $YAMLPATH/kata-deploy/base/kata-deploy.yaml
 
     # deploy kata:
-    kubectl apply -f kata-deploy.yaml
+    kubectl apply -f $YAMLPATH/kata-deploy/base/kata-deploy.yaml
 
     # in case the control plane is slow, give it a few seconds to accept the yaml, otherwise
     # our 'wait' for deployment status will fail to find the deployment at all. If it can't persist
@@ -137,29 +138,25 @@ function test_kata() {
     # show running pods, and labels of nodes
     kubectl get pods,nodes --all-namespaces --show-labels
 
-    run_test $PKG_SHA
+    run_test
 
     kubectl get pods,nodes --show-labels
 
     # Remove Kata
-    kubectl delete -f kata-deploy.yaml
+    kubectl delete -f $YAMLPATH/kata-deploy/base/kata-deploy.yaml
     kubectl -n kube-system wait --timeout=10m --for=delete -l name=kata-deploy pod
 
     kubectl get pods,nodes --show-labels
 
-    kubectl apply -f kata-cleanup.yaml
+    kubectl apply -f $YAMLPATH/kata-cleanup/base/kata-cleanup.yaml
 
     # The cleanup daemonset will run a single time, since it will clear the node-label. Thus, its difficult to
     # check the daemonset's status for completion. instead, let's wait until the kata-runtime labels are removed
     # from all of the worker nodes. If this doesn't happen after 2 minutes, let's fail
-    timeout=20
-    sleeptime=6
-    waitForLabelRemoval $timeout $sleeptime
+    timeout=120
+    waitForLabelRemoval $timeout
 
-    kubectl delete -f kata-cleanup.yaml
-
-    rm kata-cleanup.yaml
-    rm kata-deploy.yaml
+    kubectl delete -f $YAMLPATH/kata-cleanup/base/kata-cleanup.yaml
 
     set +x
 }
diff --git a/kata-deploy/scripts/kata-deploy.sh b/kata-deploy/scripts/kata-deploy.sh
index 012b795c6..139bc5dc6 100755
--- a/kata-deploy/scripts/kata-deploy.sh
+++ b/kata-deploy/scripts/kata-deploy.sh
@@ -32,18 +32,19 @@ function print_usage() {
 }
 
 function get_container_runtime() {
-	local runtime="$(kubectl describe node $NODE_NAME)"
+
+	local runtime=$(kubectl get node $NODE_NAME -o jsonpath='{.status.nodeInfo.containerRuntimeVersion}' | awk -F '[:]' '{print $1}')
 	if [ "$?" -ne 0 ]; then
                 die "invalid node name"
 	fi
-	if echo "$runtime" | grep -qE 'Container Runtime Version.*containerd.*-k3s'; then
+	if echo "$runtime" | grep -qE 'containerd.*-k3s'; then
 		if systemctl is-active --quiet k3s-agent; then
 			echo "k3s-agent"
 		else
 			echo "k3s"
 		fi
 	else
-		echo "$runtime" | awk -F'[:]' '/Container Runtime Version/ {print $2}' | tr -d ' '
+		echo "$runtime"
 	fi
 }