Owncast

What is it?

Owncast turns any computer into your own live streaming channel. You get a page where people watch and chat in real time, and you broadcast to it from OBS or any standard streaming software — the same workflow streamers already know.

It’s famously light: it runs on a cheap rented server, a home machine, even a Raspberry Pi. There’s a simple admin page for your stream key, viewer stats and chat moderation.

What does it replace?

It’s the independent option next to Twitch, and it covers what streaming tools like StreamYard (from ~$20/month — check their site) charge for. Big platforms work on a simple trade: they take a cut and set the rules. With Owncast there’s no cut, and the rules are yours.

What does it cost you?

Zero. Unlimited streams, as many viewers as your bandwidth can carry.

Get it running

The easiest install on this site. Copy the text below, paste it into Claude (or Claude Code), and if you already use OBS you’ll be live in about ten minutes.

Set up a self-hosted Owncast live streaming server on this machine.

1. Install Owncast the official way (https://owncast.online/docs): either run the one-line installer script for the standalone binary, or use Docker with `docker run -d -p 8080:8080 -p 1935:1935 --name owncast owncast/owncast:latest` — prefer Docker if it's available here.
2. Verify the service is up: the public page should load at http://localhost:8080 and the admin dashboard at http://localhost:8080/admin (default stream key/admin password is abc123 — change it immediately and show me how).
3. Walk me through connecting OBS: server rtmp://<this-machine>:1935/live with the stream key, and recommend sane bitrate/encoder settings for this machine's hardware.
4. Do a short local test stream and confirm playback and chat work in the browser.
5. When I'm ready to go public, set up TLS and open/forward ports 8080 and 1935.