diff --git a/core/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts b/core/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
index 7acf5731ce..d1a3d66beb 100644
--- a/core/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
+++ b/core/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
@@ -40,6 +40,7 @@ import {
 } from "../types"
 import { k8sGetContainerDeployStatus, ContainerServiceStatus } from "./status"
 import { emitNonRepeatableWarning } from "../../../warnings"
+import { K8_POD_DEFAULT_CONTAINER_ANNOTATION_KEY } from "../run"
 
 export const DEFAULT_CPU_REQUEST = "10m"
 export const DEFAULT_MEMORY_REQUEST = "90Mi" // This is the minimum in some clusters - or so they tell me
@@ -492,6 +493,9 @@ function workloadConfig({
   }
 
   const { annotations, daemon } = action.getSpec()
+  // Add default-container annotation in generated manifest
+  // so exec respects it in case of multiple containers in pod
+  annotations[K8_POD_DEFAULT_CONTAINER_ANNOTATION_KEY] = action.name
 
   return {
     kind: daemon ? "DaemonSet" : "Deployment",
diff --git a/core/test/integ/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts b/core/test/integ/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
index 7bcb642fd3..4c248d1dce 100644
--- a/core/test/integ/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
+++ b/core/test/integ/src/plugins/kubernetes/container/deployment.ts
@@ -51,6 +51,7 @@ import { ResolvedDeployAction } from "../../../../../../src/actions/deploy"
 import { ActionRouter } from "../../../../../../src/router/router"
 import { ActionMode } from "../../../../../../src/actions/types"
 import { createActionLog } from "../../../../../../src/logger/log-entry"
+import { K8_POD_DEFAULT_CONTAINER_ANNOTATION_KEY } from "../../../../../../src/plugins/kubernetes/run"
 
 describe("kubernetes container deployment handlers", () => {
   let garden: TestGarden
@@ -289,7 +290,9 @@ describe("kubernetes container deployment handlers", () => {
           selector: { matchLabels: { [gardenAnnotationKey("action")]: action.key() } },
           template: {
             metadata: {
-              annotations: {},
+              annotations: {
+                [K8_POD_DEFAULT_CONTAINER_ANNOTATION_KEY]: "simple-service",
+              },
               labels: getDeploymentLabels(action),
             },
             spec: {
@@ -331,7 +334,10 @@ describe("kubernetes container deployment handlers", () => {
       const action = await resolveDeployAction("simple-service")
       const namespace = provider.config.namespace!.name!
 
-      action["_config"].spec.annotations = { "annotation.key": "someValue" }
+      action["_config"].spec.annotations = {
+        "annotation.key": "someValue",
+        [K8_POD_DEFAULT_CONTAINER_ANNOTATION_KEY]: "simple-service",
+      }
 
       const resource = await createWorkloadManifest({
         ctx,