5 Free Live Streaming Options

Video is a great way to engage your internet community, but not all platforms are created equal. Here are a few options you can look into when planning your next live stream.

YouTube Live

YouTube live is a great way to connect with your audience worldwide if you’re a part of the YouTube partner program. Your subscribers are notified when you’re live. YouTube encourages you to promote your stream at least 48 hours before you broadcast by sharing your streaming link. You can also monetize your stream.

Unfortunately, the partner program is changing on February 20th, 2018. Your channel would need to have had 4,000 hours of watch-time in the last 12 months and 1,000 subscribers. If you don’t meet YouTube’s new requirements by then, you may not have access to this YouTube feature moving forward.

Instagram Live

Instagram Live is open to everyone and allows you to add a friend to host a story with you. Your audience can also request to join your live story. Anyone you add can be removed at any point during the stream. Whether you’re conducting an interview, or just needed a “hype-man”, everyone will get their shine. Instagram Live’s screen will split into equal halves in the story. This feature only works with two people.

You and your audience will also be able to share the live video in your Instagram DMs while it’s happening. The current live stream maximum is one hour.

Facebook Live

Facebook Live allows you to go live for up to four hours at a time. While the stream allowed is longer than Instagram, it has some limitations of its own. While you can live stream solo on many devices, to add another host to your stream you have to use Facebook’s app ‘Mentions’ on an iPhone. So, while Facebook Live’s feature is open to everyone, collaboration has the barrier of needing an iPhone, at least for now.

Twitter Live

Twitter is an interesting platform for live streaming because people head to Twitter to chat and engage. This is arguable different from YouTube, Facebook and Instagram where audiences are more likely logging in to be entertained and/or inspired. However, you can’t go live if your tweets are protected. You can share your private thoughts live via Periscope.

Twitch

Twitch is one of the largest, if not the largest, gaming communities online. You can live stream your games and record them, with your commentary, for a community that already loves what you love.

This list is certainly not exhaustive, but a good start to deciding what platform is the best for your content. They’re also very much free to use! There are paid options out there if these options don’t meet your needs.

What are you currently using to stream your videos and why? We’d love to know how you Define Digital in the comments!