diff --git a/test/integration/functional_test.go b/test/integration/functional_test.go
index a54bcd304f..4469631e27 100644
--- a/test/integration/functional_test.go
+++ b/test/integration/functional_test.go
@@ -126,30 +126,14 @@ func TestFunctional(t *testing.T) {
 
 // validateNodeLabels checks if minikube cluster is created with correct kubernetes's node label
 func validateNodeLabels(ctx context.Context, t *testing.T, profile string) {
-	rr, err := Run(t, exec.CommandContext(ctx, "kubectl", "--context", profile, "get", "nodes", "--output", "jsonpath={.items[0].metadata.labels}"))
+	rr, err := Run(t, exec.CommandContext(ctx, "kubectl", "--context", profile, "get", "nodes", "--output=go-template", "--template='{{range $k, $v := (index .items 0).metadata.labels}}{{$k}} {{end}}'"))
 	if err != nil {
 		t.Errorf("%s failed: %v", rr.Args, err)
 	}
-
-	var labels []string
-	// json output:
-	// [beta.kubernetes.io/arch:amd64 beta.kubernetes.io/os:linux minikube.k8s.io/commit:aa91f39ffbcf27dcbb93c4ff3f457c54e585cf4a-dirty minikube.k8s.io/name:p1 minikube.k8s.io/updated_at:2020_02_20T12_05_35_0700 minikube.k8s.io/version:v1.7.3 kubernetes.io/arch:amd64 kubernetes.io/hostname:p1 kubernetes.io/os:linux node-role.kubernetes.io/master:]
-	err = json.Unmarshal(rr.Stdout.Bytes(), &labels)
-	if err != nil {
-		t.Errorf("%s umarshaling node label from json failed: %v", rr.Args, err)
-	}
-
 	expectedLabels := []string{"minikube.k8s.io/commit", "minikube.k8s.io/version", "minikube.k8s.io/updated_at", "minikube.k8s.io/name"}
 	for _, el := range expectedLabels {
-		found := false
-		for _, l := range labels {
-			if strings.Contains(l, el) {
-				found = true
-				break
-			}
-		}
-		if !found {
-			t.Errorf("Failed to have label %q in node labels %+v", expectedLabels, labels)
+		if !strings.Contains(rr.Output(), el) {
+			t.Errorf("expected to have label %q in node labels: %q", expectedLabels, rr.Output())
 		}
 	}
 }