How to Add Live Stream to Your WordPress Website?

How do you take a popular content format like video and make it better? Broadcast live of course! Businesses, marketers and individuals are all going well with this new form of content. You can too, because of its accessibility – you can start live streaming with a little more than you need to create a regular video.

And you can do it on your website if you want – there’s no reason to send your website visitors to various streaming platforms when you’ve put so much effort into getting them to visit your website, right? With WordPress, live streaming a website doesn’t have to be any more difficult than adding regular video to your site, for example, from YouTube.

In this article, we will show you:

What’s So Great About Live Streaming?

While both are based on the viewer’s love of visual content, having one live and the other created allows you to upload live streamed video and video that you will make and two very different beasts. You can write, shoot and edit a regular, on-demand video script. You can rewrite, reshoot, and rearrange if you want.

But you can’t do that with live video. No fix it in post production. You get what you prepared, which can make live video streaming exciting. But that’s not the primary reason for doing this, and especially not live-streaming to your WordPress website.

Here are some of the reasons why live streaming is such a popular way to create and consume video content:

As a widely available content format, live video content can be incredibly valuable to everyone, from businesses and influencers to hobbyists and gamers. It’s suitable for sharing gameplay footage, holding shareholder meetings, and can even come in handy when creating online courses. If there is something you want to share online, live video streaming may be the right way to do it..

What Do You Need to Stream Live Video?

Let’s put aside for a moment that you want to livestream to your WordPress website and focus on what you need to be able to livestream. Adding live streaming to WordPress is the least demanding part of this effort in every possible way..

We’ll keep it simple. A live stream needs three things: hardware and software required to capture and encode audio and video, a streaming platform to receive encoded information and convert it to audio and video, and an internet connection to transfer data.

Live Streaming Hardware and Software

You’d be surprised how little you need in terms of software and hardware to get started with live streaming. The basic setup will only include a webcam and a computer. The webcam will be the audio and video source and the computer will provide access to a streaming platform..

Replace computer with smartphone, webcam with smartphone camera, and web browser with an app; You get everything you need for streaming right there in your pocket. However, keep in mind that this is the simplest possible streaming setup. Any upgrade to the hardware will complicate the installation..

If you want to use a DSLR camera instead of a webcam, you need to connect it to the streaming platform via an encoder (a hardware or software) and also add a capture card to the setup. . There is probably an external microphone as well.

This increase in complexity will inevitably increase the price of your streaming setup, but you can still get many of its components for free or bargain.. Hardware encoders are expensive and are usually only needed for professional live video streaming. You can use a free software encoder such as OBS Studio instead and run it on your computer.

Live Streaming Platforms

You can create your streaming server and use it for live streaming video. The reason you don’t do this is for the same reason you don’t host your videos – it’s resource intensive and there are better options out there..

When it comes to live streaming, There are dedicated streaming platforms you can use like Twitch. There are also video platforms like YouTube and Dailymotion. this would be fine for hosting one or two streams or hundreds of them.

But the real hit comes in the form of social networks that can host your live streams. Almost all majors have live streaming services, and this includes Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even LinkedIn.. Some will have requirements in terms of the number of followers you need to use live streaming, and most will have their own recommendations regarding the speed of your internet connection.

You can also choose a more stylish and professional-looking live streaming experience. Dedicated streaming platforms will give you more control over your content and how it is displayed on your website.. These platforms include: Vimeo-Live broadcast, dacastand IBM Video Streaming.

How to Add Live Stream in WordPress

Once you’ve got everything set up – hook up all the streaming equipment, choose the platform you’re going to use, and test your entire setup a few times to make sure there aren’t any unpleasant mid-stream surprises, you’re ready to go live and add. Stream to your WordPress website.

Viewing a live video stream on a WordPress website is as simple as adding any other type of video to a WordPress website. Simply get the embed code for your video from the streaming platform;. There is no need to search and install plugins for this, but it won’t hurt to use WordPress gaming themes that come with support for certain platforms.

Let’s say you want to host your live stream on YouTube. While connecting your stream and you will be able to see the stream preview. Copy only after clicking the Share button will copy the link of your stream to the clipboard.

You can then go to your website and paste this link into the Classic image editor or a YouTube blog if you’re using Gutenberg. If for some reason that doesn’t work, or you want some control over the size of the video, you can set up an iFrame by clicking the Embed button..

You can copy the code and paste it into the text editor in the Classic text editor or into a paragraph block in Gutenberg. You can also edit the code and change the size of the player..

Facebook Live video procedure is similar. If you want to embed the video it should be set to Public and you can use the Classic visual editor with the appropriate block and stream link in Gutenberg. If that doesn’t work, you can get the iFrame embed code when setting up the live stream..

Facebook gives you the option to choose the size of the video so you don’t have to edit the code yourself.

And that’s all. After you embed the live stream on your website, you can see it in the visual editor or after pressing the preview button if you used Guttenberg. Either way, saving the link or code to your page or post will allow your website visitors to see your live stream..

Let’s wrap it up!

Live video streaming has been gaining a solid fan base for the better part of the last decade. It’s currently a multi-billion dollar industry and its platforms bring together content creators and marketers. Some of the biggest names in tech are investing heavily in it.

However, live video is only one type of content after all, and one that you may find useful in your search for new customers, clients, or audience members. So, if you’re looking for ways to bring live streaming to your WordPress website, remember – adding the stream to your website is the easy part. And setting up the live stream isn’t that hard either, so there’s no reason not to try it.