# Go live from your browser: no OBS, no downloads, no follower minimum

You can start a live stream on OpenVibe.Live from a web browser, with nothing to install and no follower, subscriber or equipment requirement. Open the site, press **Go Live**, allow your camera and microphone, and you are live. It works on a Chromebook, a laptop or a phone. OpenVibe.Live is open source and run by its community.

## How to go live in your browser

1. Open [openvibe.live](https://openvibe.live) in Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari.
2. Sign in, or make an account. It takes a minute, and your channel exists as soon as you do (`openvibe.live/@yourname`).
3. Press **Go Live** in the top bar.
4. Allow your camera and microphone when the browser asks.
5. Give the stream a title and press **Start**. You are live, with your own channel page and chat.

## What you need

- **A modern browser:** Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari, on Windows, macOS, Linux, ChromeOS, Android or iOS.
- **A camera and a microphone:** the ones built into your laptop or phone are enough. You can also share your screen instead of a camera.
- **An OpenVibe account.**

You don't need any of the following:
- **Software:** no OBS, Streamlabs or plug-ins.
- **An audience:** no minimum number of followers or subscribers, and no history of past streams.
- **Equipment:** no capture card or gaming PC.

## What you can do while live

- **Flip cameras:** front and back on a phone in one tap, or choose any connected webcam.
- **Share your screen,** a window or a tab. You can also show your camera in a corner over it.
- **Mute** your microphone or turn off your camera without ending the stream.
- **Watch your stream's health:** bitrate, frame rate and resolution.
- **Chat with viewers** on the same page. Your stream can be kept as a VOD, and people can clip it.

**On a phone,** going live turns the screen into a live studio, the way phone streaming apps work:

- The camera fills the screen, and chat runs over the bottom of the picture, where you can read and answer it.
- The top shows LIVE, how long you have been live, how many people are watching, your restreams and your connection.
  The number watching counts everywhere your stream goes: OpenVibe, RobotStreamer, Twitch, Kick and YouTube. Tap it
  to see each one. Viewers see the same count on your channel's player, and can tap it too.
- The buttons on the right are Flip (front and back camera), Mute, Camera, Light (a back camera's flash), Chat (hide or
  show it), Clip (the last 30 seconds) and More.
- **More** opens copy link, watch as a viewer, choose any camera, media requests, a one-minute clip,
  **video quality**, chat read aloud, your restreams, stream health, all settings and the full page.
- **Video quality** changes while you are live, without restarting the stream: 480p, 720p or 1080p, at 30 or 60 frames
  a second. It shows what is being sent now, and your choice becomes the stream slot's default for next time.
  **Battery saver** (480p at 30 fps) keeps the phone cooler and the stream going longer; it is a setting of that phone
  only.
- A phone sends H.264, which its hardware encodes, so the stream uses less battery and keeps its frame rate. When the
  network or the phone gets busy, the picture gets softer before it gets choppy.
- **Turn the phone whenever you like.** Viewers' players take your picture's shape, upright or sideways, and ease from
  one to the other when you turn. The recording keeps each part in its own shape too.
- **End** asks before it ends the stream.
- Keep the OpenVibe tab open and in front while you are live. A phone pauses the camera in other tabs and apps, and
  the stream ends after a minute away, so "Watch as a viewer" opens over the studio instead of in a new tab.

Your stream reaches viewers over **WebRTC**, with less than a second of delay. That is fast enough for a real conversation with chat, and for viewers to control a robot or camera in real time.

## When to use OBS instead

The browser is the fastest way to start. For a produced show with scenes, overlays and several sources, OpenVibe.Live also takes **OBS or any RTMP encoder**, **WHIP** (OBS 30+, ffmpeg, GStreamer or your own web page) and **ffmpeg** from a command line, such as from a Raspberry Pi. See [Broadcasting](/docs/broadcasting.md) for every method, and the [WHIP ingest API](/docs/whip.md) to publish from your own site.

## Questions

**Can I stream without OBS?**
Yes. OpenVibe.Live has a browser broadcaster built in. Press Go Live and allow your camera and microphone.

**Do I need followers or subscribers to go live?**
No. Every account can go live from the first minute. There is no follower, subscriber, age-of-account or past-stream requirement.

**Can I stream from a Chromebook or a phone?**
Yes. The broadcaster runs in the browser, so it works on ChromeOS, Android and iOS as well as Windows, macOS and Linux.

**Can I share my screen?**
Yes. Share a screen, a window or a browser tab, with or without your camera over it.

**Is there a delay?**
Browser broadcasts use WebRTC, with less than a second of delay.

**Is it open source?**
Yes. The code is at [github.com/OpenVibers/OpenVibe.Live](https://github.com/OpenVibers/OpenVibe.Live), and the platform is part of the OpenVibe network: one account works across all of its sites.