How to stream a game to YouTube, Facebook and more at once with Restream

Your parents are on Facebook, the alumni watch on YouTube and the students want Twitch. Streaming to all three from one phone or one laptop would triple your upload and split your attention. Restream solves that: you send one stream to Restream, and it relays the video to every platform you connect. This guide covers when multistreaming makes sense, how to set up Restream, and how to send to it from the ScoreCastr iPhone app or from OBS.

When multistreaming makes sense

Multistream when your audience really is split across platforms and you have the rights to put the game on all of them. Don't when:

• The rights are exclusive. Many state associations and conferences have streaming agreements, and in many states postseason games can stream only to the NFHS Network. A game that's exclusive to one platform can't also go to YouTube and Facebook. Check with your athletic director or state association, and read our guide to streaming rights.
• You can't watch the chats. Three platforms means three comment sections on video of students. If nobody can moderate them, stream to fewer places.
• One platform already reaches everyone. Multistreaming adds another service, account and set of settings to manage. If nearly all your viewers use the team's Facebook Page, just stream there with the Facebook phone setup.

How Restream works

Without Restream, sending to three platforms means three separate uploads from the venue. At 6 Mbps each, that's more than most press boxes or hotspots can hold. With Restream, your phone or laptop sends one stream to Restream's RTMP server. Restream's servers then pass it on to each connected channel.

How many channels you can connect, and which features you get, depends on Restream's plan. Plan limits are Restream's, so check the current details on restream.io before you promise three platforms to your booster club.

Connect your channels in Restream

Do this at home, days before the game:

1. Create a Restream account for the program, not a personal one, so it stays with the team.
2. Add each destination. Restream supports YouTube, Facebook, Twitch and more. You sign in to each platform from inside Restream to authorize it, and for Facebook you choose whether it posts to a Page, profile or group. Pick the team Page.
3. Turn each channel on or off per event. You might send varsity to all three and JV only to Facebook.

Each platform still has its own rules underneath. A YouTube channel needs live streaming enabled first, which can take up to 24 hours the first time. A Facebook Page needs the account you connected to have a Page role that allows going live. Sort those out before game day.

Titles, privacy and scheduling

This is where multistreams usually go wrong. Restream can send a title and description to connected channels, but each platform still decides visibility and audience in its own way. Before the first game:

• YouTube: check the visibility (public, unlisted or private) and the made-for-kids audience setting in YouTube Studio. A stream that comes through as private is invisible to everyone but you.
• Facebook: confirm it posts to the Page, not the profile of whoever connected the account.
• Twitch: Twitch streams are always public. Set the category to Sports in Stream Manager so viewers can browse to you.
• Scheduling: if you want a shareable link before the game, schedule events on the platforms that support it. Check Restream's help for how scheduled events on each platform link to your Restream stream.

Run one test per platform and look at each live page from a logged-out phone. That's the only reliable way to see what fans will see.

Option 1: send from the ScoreCastr iPhone app

The ScoreCastr iPhone app has been tested with Restream. It's in public beta on TestFlight and free during the beta, with Android coming later. One phone scores and the other films and streams, with the scoreboard built into the video, so every platform gets the same picture with the same graphics.

1. In Restream, find the RTMP server URL and stream key for streaming software, and copy both.
2. Create the match on the scoring phone. Pair the filming phone by scanning the match's QR code; it needs no account.
3. Paste Restream's server URL and key into the filming phone's stream settings.
4. Frame in landscape, set zoom (0.5x to 3x) and mic level, and confirm the scorebug switch is on.

Scoring in the app is football first, with more sports coming. For other sports, the scorekeeper can run the ScoreCastr dashboard at scorecastr.co in a phone browser while the iPhone app streams. The phone sends 1080p at 30fps, about 6 Mbps, which is about 5.4 GB of data for a two-hour game, and steps the bitrate down if the upload can't keep up. See the two-phone stream for more on mounts and roles.

Option 2: send from OBS

If you already stream from a laptop with OBS Studio, only the destination changes:

1. In OBS, open Settings, then Stream. Choose Restream from the service list if it's offered, or choose Custom and paste Restream's server URL and stream key.
2. For the scoreboard, add the ScoreCastr match's overlay link as a Browser Source at 1920×1080 in your live scene. The ScoreCastr web app makes the graphics; OBS sends the video. Our guide to adding a scoreboard overlay to OBS walks through it.
3. Set your output bitrate to something your venue upload can hold with headroom, since one stream now feeds every platform.

Game-day checklist

• Rights confirmed for every platform you're sending to.
• Channels connected in Restream and the right ones switched on for tonight.
• Visibility checked on YouTube, Page destination checked on Facebook, category set on Twitch.
• Restream server URL and key saved in the phone app or OBS.
• Upload tested at the venue at game time.
• A moderator assigned for each platform's chat.
• After going live, each platform's watch page checked from a logged-out phone.
• At the final, stop the stream at the source, then check that each platform shows the stream as ended.