WordPress itself does none of that, so every way to stream on it hands the video to something else. This guide goes through each of them, what it takes to set up and to run, and then walks through going live with Live Stream, the plugin we make for it.

The ways at a glance​

1. Embed a stream from YouTube, Facebook or Twitch​

The quickest way needs no plugin at all. Go live on YouTube, Facebook or Twitch, copy the embed code of the stream, and paste it into a Custom HTML block. For YouTube, pasting the address of the stream into a YouTube block works too.

Good: it costs nothing, these platforms carry any audience, and many people already know how to watch there.

Not so good:

• The stream lives on the platform. Viewers watch in its player, the chat and the audience belong to its account, and its rules decide what you may stream.
• Your site cannot say who watches. Anyone with the link can, and a members only stream needs the private or unlisted settings of the platform, which know nothing of your members.
• These platforms deliver video in segments of a few seconds, so viewers see the host several seconds after it happens, and a question in the chat is about a moment the host has already moved past.

Fits: a public show that should also reach people on the platform itself.

2. A paid streaming service​

Hosted streaming services give you an ingest address for your encoder and a player to embed, without the branding and suggestions of a social platform. Many are priced by the hours watched, or by a plan with a monthly allowance.

Good: a clean player on your page, and the service handles the scale.

Not so good: the player still knows nothing of your members, so access needs tokens or passwords from the service. The chat is a separate product, if there is one. Most deliver over HLS, with the same few seconds of delay as the platforms above.

Fits: a company that streams events to a large public audience and wants its own look.

3. Your own streaming server​

Open source servers take an RTMP or WebRTC stream in and send it out to players. You rent a server, install one, and embed its player.

Good: full control, and no service in between.

Not so good: you run it. Every viewer is a stream out of your server, so bandwidth grows with the audience, and a crowd needs more servers in more places. The player, the chat, who may watch and keeping it all up to date are yours to build.

Fits: a team with someone who runs servers, and a reason to.

4. A meeting tool​

Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams run webinars, and a WordPress plugin can create the meetings for you and put the link on a page.

Good: everyone can come on camera, and these tools record.

Not so good: people leave your site for the app of the meeting, and a meeting is not a broadcast: it is built for people who talk to each other, and its webinar plans are priced by host and by audience size.

Fits: a class where students speak on camera, a team meeting.

5. A live streaming plugin​

A plugin can put the whole stream on your own pages: the host goes live from the WordPress admin, viewers watch on a page of your site, and the chat sits beside the player. The plugin needs a service behind it to carry the video, because a WordPress server cannot send a live picture to many viewers at once.

This is what Live Stream does. Its video and chat run on WordPlus Cloud, and your site keeps the decisions:

• Hosts go live from the browser, with a camera, a microphone and a shared screen, in Live Stream → Studio, or from OBS 30 or later over WHIP.
• Viewers watch in the browser over WebRTC, with low delay and no app, on any page you put the stream on, with the block or the shortcode.
• Your site decides who watches: everyone, logged-in users, or the roles you choose, and a membership plugin can decide with a filter.
• The chat is beside the stream, with reactions and moderation, or a Better Messages chat room saved on your site.

Not so good: it needs a WordPlus Cloud subscription that includes live streaming, and it is a beta.

Fits: streams for your own audience, on your own site: classes, members only shows, Q&A sessions, launches, community streams.

Going live on WordPress with Live Stream​

What you need​

• WordPress 6.0 or later and PHP 7.4 or later.
• Your site on HTTPS. Browsers let a page use the camera and the microphone only over HTTPS.
• A WordPlus Cloud subscription that includes live streaming. Each site streams to 50 viewers at once unmetered, however long they watch, and each viewer above that takes a credit a minute (Viewers and credits).
• An upload that carries your picture: up to about 4 Mbps for HD, up to about 8 Mbps for Full HD.

1. Install the plugin​

In WordPress, go to Plugins → Add New Plugin, search for WordPlus Live Stream, press Install Now, then Activate. A Live Stream menu appears in the admin.

2. Activate the licence​

Go to Live Stream → Licence and enter your WordPlus Cloud licence key. A site that already runs Better Messages on the subscription is connected already.

3. Create a stream​

Open Live Stream → Studio → Streams and press Create stream. Give it a title, a start time if you like, a cover, and choose who can watch. Press Save changes.

4. Put it on a page​

Press Create a page beside the stream in the Studio tab, and Live Stream publishes a page with the stream on it, the chat beside the player. Or add the Live stream block to any page, or paste its shortcode, such as [wordplus_stream id="12"], into a page builder.

A stream with a start time shows a countdown until you go live, with Add to calendar.

5. Go live​

In Live Stream → Studio, choose Go live beside the stream to open its studio. Choose Turn on camera and microphone, pick your devices and the quality, and press Go live. Everyone on the page sees the stream begin, without reloading.

For scenes, overlays and several cameras, stream from OBS instead: How to stream from OBS to WordPress over WHIP.

Before your first stream​

• Try it on a page nobody else knows. Go live, and watch it from another device, on another network if you can.
• Watch the statistics. While you are live, the studio shows how your picture goes out, and Statistics opens the details (When your stream goes out badly).
• Plan the start. A start time gives viewers a countdown and a calendar entry, and your page can collect them before you begin.
• Choose the chat. The light chat is for the moment and is gone a day after. A Better Messages chat room keeps every message (Chat and moderation).

Frequently asked questions​

Can I live stream on WordPress for free?​

Embedding a stream from YouTube, Facebook or Twitch costs nothing. Live Stream is free to download, and streaming with it needs a WordPlus Cloud subscription, which streams to 50 viewers at once on each site unmetered.

Will live streaming slow down my WordPress server?​

Not with a plugin built on a streaming service. The video goes from the host to WordPlus Cloud and from there to each viewer, never through your server, and the page of a public stream works with page caching, so a crowd of viewers is not a crowd of requests to WordPress.

Do viewers need an account?​

Only if you want them to. Each stream is for everyone, for logged-in users, or for the roles you choose.

Can I go live from my phone?​

Yes. The studio works in the browser of a phone, with its front or back camera.

Can I record the stream?​

Yes. A stream can be recorded while live, and its page then plays the replay (Recording and replays).

This guide sets it up with Live Stream, step by step, with the OBS settings that decide how soon viewers see the picture and how smoothly it plays.

What WHIP is, and why it matters​

For years, encoders sent streams over RTMP. RTMP takes the stream to a server, which repackages it for viewers, usually as HLS: short files of a few seconds each, which players download one after another. It works at any scale, and it puts viewers several seconds behind the host.

WHIP, the WebRTC-HTTP Ingestion Protocol, sends the stream over WebRTC instead, the technology browsers use for video calls. It is an IETF standard (RFC 9725). The encoder asks a WHIP server address, with a bearer token, to take its stream, and from then on the picture flows as WebRTC packets. A WebRTC service can pass those packets on to viewers as they arrive, so they see the host with low delay, close enough to react in the chat while the moment is still on screen. More on why: Low latency live streaming: why WebRTC.

OBS has had WHIP since version 30. FFmpeg has a WHIP output as well, from version 8.

What you need​

• OBS 30 or later. For layers (below), OBS 32.1 or later.
• A WordPress site with Live Stream and a WordPlus Cloud subscription that includes live streaming (How to live stream on a WordPress site covers installing it).
• A stream in Live Stream → Studio → Streams, on a page of your site.

Connect OBS, step by step​

1. Open the studio of the stream. In Live Stream → Studio, choose Go live beside the stream, then Stream from OBS. With the camera already on, it is under More. The studio shows the steps, with "Waiting for OBS…".
2. In OBS, open Settings → Stream and choose WHIP as the service.
3. Copy Server from the studio into the Server field of OBS.
4. Copy Bearer token from the studio into the Bearer Token field of OBS.
5. Set Total Layers to 3, in the same window, if your OBS has it (32.1 or newer).
6. Set the output of OBS as below, then press Start Streaming in OBS.
7. Check the picture. Once it arrives, the studio says OBS is connected and previews it with its size, frame rate and bitrate. Only you see it so far.
8. Press Go live in the studio. Viewers see the whole picture from OBS.

The token is the key of the stream. Only its hosts see it, and New key in the studio makes a new one if it was seen by someone it should not have been.

The OBS settings that matter​

Layers: one picture in three sizes​

With Total Layers at 3, OBS sends the full picture and two smaller copies of it at once. Each viewer gets the largest their screen and connection take, and a viewer whose connection slows down steps down to a smaller copy instead of stopping to wait.

Layers cost upload. OBS gives the full picture the bitrate you set and the copies two thirds and one third of it, so 4,500 kbps takes about 9 Mbit/s of upload in all. If your upload cannot carry that, set a lower bitrate, or 2 layers.

Without layers, every viewer gets the same picture, so choose a size that every connection can take.

Size and bitrate​

• Settings → Video: Output (Scaled) Resolution 1920×1080 at 30 FPS with layers. Without layers, 1280×720 lets viewers on slow connections keep up.
• Settings → Output: choose the Advanced output mode, and under Streaming set the bitrate to about 4,500 kbps with layers, or 2,500 kbps without.

These are a starting point. What suits a stream depends on what it shows, on the computer that sends it and on its connection.

Keyframes and B-frames​

Two settings decide how soon viewers see the picture and how smoothly it plays, and only the Advanced output mode of OBS has them (Settings → Output → Output Mode, then the Streaming tab):

• Keyframe Interval: 1 s. A viewer sees the picture from the next keyframe on, when they arrive and when they come back to the page from another tab. The Simple output mode leaves the interval on auto, about one keyframe every 8 seconds, so viewers can wait that long. At 1 s, they wait a second at most.
• Max B-frames: 0. Browsers skip B-frames, so a picture with them stutters. Some encoders start this setting at 2 in the Advanced mode.

Keep the Video Encoder the Simple mode had, a hardware encoder of your graphics card where there is one, and leave the rest as it is.

The studio checks both while OBS sends, and says what to change, without stopping you from going live.

Try it before your audience does​

1. Make a stream for trying, on a page nobody else knows, start streaming in OBS and press Go live.
2. Open its page on another device, on another network if you can, and watch for a few minutes, with the kind of picture you will stream.
3. Keep View → Stats open in OBS: it shows frames skipped by the encoder and frames dropped on the way out.

Then change one thing at a time:

A stream that runs by itself​

For a stream sent from a computer that is always on, such as a demo or a camera on a view, turn on Go live when OBS connects in the settings of the stream. It then goes live as soon as OBS starts streaming with its token, with nobody in the studio, and stays live for as long as OBS sends. If OBS stops, the stream stays live while anyone watches, ends after five minutes with nobody watching, and goes live again as soon as OBS is back.

When OBS does not connect​

• The studio stays on "Waiting for OBS…": check that the service in OBS is WHIP, and that the server and the token were copied whole.
• OBS says it could not access the stream key: OBS says this whatever the server answered. Check that the token is the one the studio shows now.
• OBS cannot connect after the stream ended: an ended stream keeps OBS out. Choose Stream from OBS in its studio again, then start streaming in OBS.

The full reference is in the docs: Streaming from OBS.

Frequently asked questions​

Can I stream to WordPress from OBS over RTMP?​

Not with Live Stream yet. It takes OBS and other encoders over WHIP. Streaming in over RTMP is planned.

Do I need OBS to go live?​

No. Live Stream also goes live from the browser, with a camera, a microphone and a shared screen. OBS is for scenes, overlays and several cameras.

What quality reaches viewers?​

Up to the picture OBS sends, and no more than 1080p. If OBS sends a bigger picture than the stream takes, the studio says so and waits until it is changed. Each viewer gets the largest layer that their player and connection need.

This post goes through where the delay comes from, why the usual way of delivering video runs many seconds behind, and how WebRTC, the technology of video calls, brings it down. It is also how Live Stream delivers its streams.

Where the delay comes from​

A live picture passes through five stages, and each adds to the delay:

1. Capture and encoding. The camera takes the frame, and the encoder, a browser or OBS, compresses it.
2. The way in. The stream travels to a server.
3. The server. It may change the stream into other sizes or formats before passing it on.
4. The way out. The stream travels to each viewer.
5. The player. It holds some of the stream before playing it, a buffer, so that a late packet does not stop the picture.

The network part is usually the small part: a fraction of a second, even across an ocean. The big differences come from what the server does with the stream, and how much the player holds.

HLS and DASH: built for scale​

Most video on the web is delivered with HLS or DASH. The server cuts the stream into short files, segments of a few seconds each, and lists them in a playlist. The player downloads one segment after another, like any other file, and holds a few of them before it starts, so the picture never runs dry.

That is why it scales so well: segments are plain files, which a CDN caches near every viewer, for any number of them. It is also why it runs behind. A segment exists only once its seconds have been recorded, and the player waits for several. An HLS stream often plays ten seconds or more behind the host. Low-Latency HLS and Low-Latency DASH cut segments into smaller parts and bring it down to a few seconds.

RTMP: the way in, not the way out​

RTMP is how encoders have sent streams to servers for years. It once played in browsers too, through Flash, and today it carries the stream only to the server, which repackages it for viewers as HLS. So an RTMP workflow has the delay of HLS.

WebRTC: built for conversation​

WebRTC is what browsers use for video calls, where a delay of seconds would make talking impossible. It sends the picture as a stream of small packets, which the receiving side plays as they arrive, holding only enough to smooth out the network. There are no segments to wait for.

For a stream with an audience, a media server sits in the middle: the host sends one stream to it, and it passes the packets on to each viewer. Two techniques make that work for many viewers with different screens and connections:

• Layers. The host sends the picture in several sizes at once, such as 720p, 540p and 360p, and the media server gives each viewer the size their player and connection need. Nothing is re-encoded on the server, so nothing waits for it.
• Repair. When a packet is lost, the viewer asks for it again, and the media server keeps the last moments of the stream to resend it.

The cost is on the side of whoever runs the media servers. A CDN cannot cache a WebRTC stream: every viewer has a live connection, and the servers must be close enough to the audience and large enough for it.

HLS and WebRTC side by side​

How Live Stream streams over WebRTC​

Live Stream delivers every stream over WebRTC, through the media servers of WordPlus Cloud:

• The host sends in layers. A host going live from the browser sends the picture in several sizes, and OBS sends up to three with its Total Layers setting (How to stream from OBS to WordPress over WHIP). Each viewer gets the size their player and connection need, so a phone gets less than a big screen.
• The camera is checked as it goes live. The browser of the host tries H.264 first, which plays on the most devices, and moves to VP9, then VP8, if the computer cannot keep up with it.
• Each viewer holds about a second while their connection plays smoothly. If the picture freezes while packets of it are lost, the player holds two seconds, then three, and comes back down after minutes without trouble. The sound follows the picture, so lips and voice stay together. The Statistics of the player show the buffer as it changes.
• No app. Viewers watch on the page of your site, in the browser.

The whole delay is that buffer plus the way through the network, so on a smooth connection viewers stay within a couple of seconds of the host, and the chat beside the picture is about what is on screen.

When HLS is the better choice​

WebRTC is not always the answer:

• Rewinding. HLS players can go back to an earlier moment of a live stream. A WebRTC stream is always at the live moment.
• A passive audience of millions. If nobody needs to talk back, files on a CDN are the cheapest way to reach a huge crowd.
• Recordings. A recorded stream is played as files anyway.

Live Stream plays over WebRTC only today. Its replays are recordings, played after the stream ends.

Frequently asked questions​

Is WebRTC only for small audiences?​

No. With media servers passing the stream on, one host reaches many viewers. A stream in Live Stream has no limit of viewers: each site streams to 50 at once unmetered, and each viewer above that takes a credit a minute (Viewers and credits).

Does a lower delay cost picture quality?​

A small buffer leaves less time to ask for a lost packet again. That is why the buffer of a Live Stream player grows when its connection loses packets, and why layers let a slow connection step down to a smaller picture instead of stopping.

Do viewers need a special browser?​

No. Every current browser plays WebRTC, on computers and phones.

What delay can I expect from YouTube or Facebook Live?​

These platforms deliver over HLS or DASH, and some offer a low latency mode. Expect a few seconds at best, more for viewers far away or on slow connections.

This post shows what members see, how a host goes live from the room, and how to set it up.

Why stream in a chat room​

Live Stream has its own light chat: text and emoji for the moment, with moderation, run by WordPlus Cloud and gone a day after the last message. That suits a public show. A community usually wants more:

• The conversation stays. Messages are saved on your site, with history and export, so what was said during the stream is there the next day.
• Everything a chat room has: files, GIFs, stickers, mentions, and the notifications and moderation of Better Messages.
• The people are already there. Members do not go to another page to watch, and the room is where they talk about the stream before it starts and after it ends.

What members see​

• The stream beside the messages. While the stream of a room is live, it opens by itself where a group video call would, beside the messages of the room.
• A Live banner over the messages and a button in the header of the room bring it back after someone closes it.
• The player among the call controls: sound and volume, the quality of the picture, reactions, picture-in-picture and full screen.
• On a phone, the stream sits on top and the chat under it.

A member who closes the stream stays in the chat, and is not counted as watching until they open it again. Where the stream should not be closed while it is live, Always on screen in the room keeps it there.

Going live from the room​

The host goes live without leaving the conversation. The button in the header of the room opens their preview, with the camera, the microphone and screen sharing in the call controls, then Go live and, at the end, End stream. While live, the host sees how the picture goes out and how many watch, and a summary once it ends.

For scenes, overlays and several cameras, the host streams from OBS in Live Stream → Studio instead, and the stream still shows in the room (How to stream from OBS to WordPress over WHIP).

Setting it up​

What you need​

• Better Messages 3.1 or later, its WebSocket version with an active licence. Its free version has no realtime connection, so every viewer would keep asking your site for new messages.
• Live Stream, on the same WordPlus Cloud subscription. A site whose Better Messages already runs on it is connected without entering a key again.

From the room​

1. Open Better Messages → Chat Rooms and edit the room.
2. Below the group call settings, choose Stream in this room. Live Stream makes a stream for the room, named after it, with the room as its chat.
3. The room now has a Live streaming section with Go live, Stream settings, Always on screen in the room and Stop streaming here.

From the stream​

Or start in Live Stream: open Live Stream → Studio → Streams, choose the stream, and set its chat to Better Messages chat room. The room is made when you save. A new stream gets one by itself where Better Messages runs its WebSocket version with an active licence.

Stop streaming here takes the stream out of the room, and the stream keeps a light chat of its own.

Who can watch and who can write​

Each stream chooses who watches: everyone, logged-in members, or the roles you choose. Who writes in the room, guests, files and moderators are the settings of the room, under Better Messages → Chat Rooms. On a public stream, visitors chat as guests where the room allows them.

The room shows wherever the chat of the stream does: beside the player on the page of the stream, in the studio of the host, and in Better Messages itself.

Ideas for a community​

• A weekly Q&A in the main room of the community, the questions saved for those who missed it.
• A members only room for paying members, with a stream only their role may watch.
• A course cohort whose teacher goes live in the room of the class, with the files of the lesson shared in the same chat.
• A launch or an event where the room fills up before the start, and keeps talking after the end.

Frequently asked questions​

Does Live Stream need Better Messages?​

No. Live Stream works on its own, with its light chat. Better Messages adds the chat room.

Does Better Messages carry anything of Live Stream when it is not installed?​

No. Better Messages shows a row about Live Stream in the room editor of its WebSocket version, and nothing else until Live Stream is installed.

Can members go live in a room?​

Administrators host streams. Another plugin can let more people host with the hooks of Live Stream (Live streams in your plugin).

Where are the docs?​

On both sides: Chat and moderation in the docs of Live Stream, and Live streaming in chat rooms in the docs of Better Messages.

Most sites run them on a meeting tool and send people a link. This post shows how to run them on your own WordPress pages instead, with Live Stream, for the people your site already knows: what each part takes, how to set it up, and where a meeting tool is still the better choice.

What a live class needs​

• A time, and a way to remember it. A countdown on the page, and an entry in the calendar of each student.
• Only the right people in. Students of the course, members of a plan, or everyone with an account.
• The teacher and the slides. A camera, and a screen to share, or a produced picture from OBS.
• Questions. A chat beside the picture, close enough to the moment that the teacher answers while it still matters, and tools to keep it on topic.
• A page for each class, and a list of what is coming up.

Schedule the class, with a countdown​

Create a stream in Live Stream → Studio → Streams and give it a time in its Schedule setting. Until the teacher goes live, its page shows the cover, a countdown to the start with its date and time, and Add to calendar, for Google Calendar or a calendar file for Apple Calendar and Outlook. When the teacher goes live, everyone waiting sees the class begin without reloading.

A weekly class or a webinar series keeps one stream with many times: one page, one chat and one OBS key, with nothing to change between sessions.

• Give each time a title of its own, such as "Spanish for beginners, lesson 4", and the countdown says it.
• Repeat these weekly copies the times on for the weeks you choose.
• After a session ends, viewers see the thanks with the next time under it, then the countdown to it.

The Live now block, or [wordplus_stream_live show="both"], lists the classes live right now and those coming up, each at its next time.

Let only your students in​

Each stream has a Who can watch setting: everyone, logged-in users, or selected roles. For a class of paying members, choose their role.

Membership and course plugins can decide more finely with the wordplus_stream_can_watch filter, which gets the decision of the stream and the ID of the user, and returns whether that user may watch:

add_filter( 'wordplus_stream_can_watch', function ( $can, $rules, $user_id ) {
    // Only students with an active membership watch.
    return $can && my_membership_is_active( $user_id );
}, 10, 3 );

Nobody else can join it.

Teach with your camera and your screen​

The teacher goes live from Live Stream → Studio in the browser: the camera, the microphone, and Share screen for slides, a document or a browser tab. The microphone is tuned for speech, with echo and background noise removed by the browser. The room behind the teacher can be blurred or replaced with a picture, and AI noise removal takes typing and fans out of the microphone (Background blur, backgrounds and noise removal).

For a produced class, with the slides and the camera in one picture, a lower third with the name of the teacher, or a second camera on a whiteboard, stream from OBS instead (How to stream from OBS to WordPress over WHIP).

Viewers watch in the browser over WebRTC, about a second behind the teacher on a smooth connection, so the chat is about what is on screen (Low latency live streaming: why WebRTC).

Questions, and a chat that stays on topic​

The chat beside the player is where students ask. For a class, these tools help:

• Pin message holds the topic, a link to the slides or the question being answered over the chat.
• Slow mode allows one message every 5, 10, 30 or 60 seconds, so a big class does not drown the questions.
• Links only from moderators keep spam out.
• Moderators are the hosts, the comment moderators of the site, and the roles you choose, such as teaching assistants. They delete messages, mute someone for a minute or a day, remove them from the stream or ban them.

For a class whose conversation should stay, with files and history, make the chat a Better Messages chat room (A live stream inside a Better Messages chat room).

A page for each class​

Create a page beside the stream in the Studio publishes a page with the stream and the chat beside it. Or start a page from the Webinar or Live event block pattern, or add the Live stream block to the page of a course or a lesson.

Course plugins can go further with the API of Live Stream, which gives each course its own stream, made and found by the course:

$stream_id = wordplus_streams()->create( array(
	'title'       => 'Weekly class',
	'object_type' => 'my_course',
	'object_id'   => 42,
	'settings'    => array( 'access' => 'logged_in', 'chat_with' => 'light' ),
) );

Hooks decide who hosts each stream, so the teacher of a course can go live from the page of the course, without access to the WordPress admin (Live streams in your plugin).

Where a meeting tool is still better​

• Students on camera. Live Stream is a broadcast: the teacher is on camera, and students write. For a seminar where everyone speaks, use a meeting tool.
• Recordings. Live Stream records a class and plays the replay on its page (Recording and replays).
• Hosts. Administrators host every stream, unless a plugin lets more people host with the hooks above.

What it costs​

Live Stream is free to download and streams on a WordPlus Cloud subscription. Each site streams to 50 viewers at once unmetered, however long the class lasts, and each viewer above that takes a credit a minute. Each WordPress site adds 5,000 credits a month to its account (Viewers and credits).

Frequently asked questions​

Can students join without an account?​

Yes, if you let them: a stream for everyone needs no account. Students who are not logged in read the chat, and write in it as Guest where the stream allows it.

How many students can watch?​

As many as come: a stream has no limit of viewers. The first 50 at once on each site are unmetered.

Can I run a class every week on the same page?​

Yes. Give the stream a time for each session, or Repeat these weekly, and it keeps its page, its chat and its OBS key.

Does it work with my LMS?​

Any course or membership plugin can decide who watches with the wordplus_stream_can_watch filter, and its pages can show a stream with the block or the shortcode. The developer API gives each course a stream of its own.