How to live stream Android games to YouTube and Twitch
Thank you
Your message has been sent.
Sorry
There was an error emailing this page.
Contributor, Greenbot | Jul 12, two thousand sixteen Four:00 AM PT
Watching people play live movie games from anywhere in the world has become a remarkably phat phenomenon in latest years. Twitch is now a game-streaming juggernaut while YouTube has embraced gaming and live streaming in a big way, and seemingly everyday people have become well-paid Internet personalities because they play movie games and talk.
Are you the next streaming sensation? Don’t bet on it—but you can still get in on the social joy of live streaming, and you don’t even need a high-end gaming PC or console to do it. It’s remarkably effortless to live stream Android games right from your phone or tablet using apps like YouTube Gaming and Mobcrush, or to use an Android emulator on your computer.
All you need is some decent bandwidth, an extroverted spirit, and hopefully decent abilities in at least one Android game. Got all that covered? Good: here’s what you need to know.
What is streaming?
In case you’re not one of the millions of gaming fans tuned into Twitch and YouTube on a regular basis, here’s a quick rundown of the live streaming phenomenon. In brief, people share live footage of themselves playing movie games, often competitive online games or those that have some kind of unique hook.
Even on a weekday morning, 26,000+ people tune in to witness a game of League of Legends on PC. The peak totals get dramatically higher than that.
This might not sound very joy, especially when you could play a game yourself, but there are often compelling reasons to observe. For example, a streamer might be an amazing player, letting you see a level of competitive play that you aspire to. Or maybe he or she does speed runs to finish games as quickly as possible, or attempt to find all the collectibles or secrets. In that sense, a live stream might prove informative. It could also just give you a look at real, unedited gameplay so you can determine whether or not to buy a game for yourself.
The social element is also significant, as viewers can not only talk with the streamer, but also other viewers. That creates a sense of community around games, and it’s a good reminder that there are best practices to go after if you’re the one doing the streaming.
Ideally, you should use the camera and microphone to display yourself playing, and be sure to react to and perhaps even describe what’s happening in the game. Also, interact with your viewers: mention them as they come into the room, speak out responses to their questions and comments, and give them reasons to stick around. And if you plan on streaming regularly, set a schedule and advertise your rivulets via social media.
YouTube Gaming
With all that set, your best option for streaming footage directly from your Android device is YouTube Gaming, the games-specific app from the movie giant. YouTube is the home to just about everything in movie, and its rivulets cover PC and console games alongside mobile stuff, with everything neatly categorized in the app. Note that you’ll need to have Android Five.0 or Five.1.1 or newer to use the streaming functionality.
Streaming with YouTube Gaming is super plain, plus it’ll archive your movies for viewing later.
Getting your stream up and running is a breeze: in the upper right corner, click the little upward-facing arrow with the Wi-Fi-like flaps above it and choose whether you want to stream or record what’s on your screen. Assuming it’s the former, you’ll pick inbetween 720P (HD) and 480P (SD) quality, choose the game you want to play, and give your channel a name. You can also share the stream link via social media before it starts running.
Once live, the feed will capture everything from your screen—so consider turning off notifications so your private messages remain that way. The front-facing camera can capture your mug, and tapping the photo brings up the controls, letting you add visual filters to your camera feed, inject talk, see how many viewers you have and the stream quality, or pause/stop the stream.
Tap your camera photo to bring up the overlay, which has quick controls and stats on your broadcast.
When you’re finished, the stream is saved as a YouTube movie and published for posterity, albeit you can always delete it if you please. YouTube Gaming is straightforward and effortless to use for direct-from-device streaming, plus YouTube has a meaty audience, so you might have an chance to reach a broad audience with your flows and saved movies.
Mobcrush
Looking for something a bit more focused than YouTube? Mobcrush, which just recently hit Android with its public beta release, is a streaming community focused entirely around mobile games. That means you won’t have to fight through endless Overwatch and League of Legends flows to find what you want… assuming what you want are Android favorites like Clash Royale, Hearthstone, and Vainglory.
Mobcrush also makes direct-from-device streaming a pretty straightforward process, plus it’s all mobile games (and fans) here.
Mobcrush has a different interface than YouTube Gaming, but isn’t difficult to figure out. To begin streaming, simply swipe from the left and tap “Broadcast.” Hit “Start Now” and input the game title and a channel description, as well as your preferred bitrate, and you’ll begin streaming instantly.
As with YouTube, it’ll capture anything that shows up on your phone screen, so keep that in mind while browsing your device—and you’ll need Android Five.0 or newer to stream. Rather than showcase your own picture on your screen during play, Mobcrush puts a puny “M” icon in view that you can haul and drop anywhere. From there, you can dig into the same kinds of settings, including movie controls and talk.
That little “M” logo on the bottom left can be moved anywhere so it doesn’t block essential UI elements. Tap it to bring up stream controls.
It’s all pretty effortless to get a drape of, and getting your stream online takes minimal effort. Mobcrush doesn’t have fairly the reach of YouTube, certainly, but the mobile-centric treatment and focused feeds might be useful for finding like-minded Android fans.
What about Twitch?
Curiously, as of this writing, the official Twitch app doesn’t let you stream gameplay directly from your Android device. That’s a surprising oversight, witnessing as Twitch is seemingly everywhere else (including game consoles), albeit I imagine that will switch soon. In the meantime, how are you supposed to broadcast your amazing Android antics onto the preeminent game streaming network?
One option is to use Screen Stream Mirroring ($Five), an all-in-one app for streaming your Android phone’s screen to Twitch or YouTube, or mirror it to a PC or another device. The app has a lot of options and settings, which might seem breathtaking at very first, but getting online with Twitch isn’t too difficult. Simply log in and find your stream key in Twitch’s settings, pick your nearest Twitch server, and then your feed should be live.
Screen Stream Mirroring isn’t fairly as streamlined as those other apps, but it’ll get your Android games onto Twitch.
It’s worth looking through all of those options, however, as you can switch the quality of your stream, enable camera and talk overlays and customize those elements, and do a lot more fine-tuning of the practice. As with the other streaming apps, you’ll need at least Android Five.0 for streaming to web services. And if your device is rooted, you can also tap into internal audio for your stream, rather than just what the microphone captures.
Ditch your phone?
Alternatively, consider using BlueStacks, an Android emulator for PC that has built-in and officially supported Twitch streaming functionality. BlueStacks is an interesting brute: it doesn’t rely on your Android device at all, and in fact, you don’t even need to own Android hardware.
BlueStacks runs purely on your Windows PC (the Mac version doesn’t have Twitch support), and it offers a streamlined version of Android right on your desktop. Once logged in with a Google account, you can download anything from your local Play Store—including anything you’ve purchased on your Android phone or tablet—and begin playing using your mouse and/or keyboard directives.
Android emulation is another way to stream games onto Twitch, albeit you won’t use your touch device at all.
Using BlueStacks is a bit off-putting, to be fair: primarily you’re only shown Asian versions of apps until you log in, and it’s an older, trimmed-down version of Android with a custom-built launcher. Furthermore, Google recognized my logins on Mac and PC to be from a Samsung Galaxy S5 and Note Three, respectively, rather than mentioning BlueStacks by name. All told, the early moments are a bit confusing.
But once you’re up and running, it works… and pretty well, too. I played Alto’s Escapade on my first-gen Surface Pro running Windows Ten, and streamed the gameplay to Twitch along with my face from the PC’s front-facing camera. Spectacle suffered just a little bit once I had the stream live, but the game was slew playable, and my Android phone never came into play. It’s an effortless way to get Android gameplay onto Twitch, even if it doesn’t indeed feel like the real thing.
Andrew Hayward is a Chicago-based games, apps, and gadgets writer whose work has been featured in more than seventy publications. He’s also a work-at-home dad to an unruly four-year-old.