Best livestreaming software for creators

Disclosure: links to Restream and Descript on this guide are affiliate links with verified partner programs, and BestCreates may earn a commission if you sign up. Every other livestreaming tool below is a plain link that earns us nothing. Commission never affects which tool we recommend or where it ranks. How we make money.

Short answer

• Streaming alone (gaming, coding, IRL from a desk): OBS Studio if you want free and full control, Streamlabs Desktop if you want alerts and widgets without plugin hunting.
• Interview or talk show with guests: StreamYard for the simplest browser studio, Riverside if the recording matters as much as the live show, Ecamm Live if you are on a Mac.
• Multistream to YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitch at once: RestreamAFFILIATE (the only one here that multistreams to two channels free), StreamYard Core (three), Ecamm Standard (ten).
• Webinars and selling live: StreamYard Advanced or Business (On-Air), Riverside's Webinar plan, or Restream with its webinar add-on.
• Pro production on Windows: vMix, bought once.

Nothing here is a universal winner. The right tool depends on whether you need guests, how many platforms you stream to, and whether you want to own the files afterward.

Before you pick: three questions that decide it

Three questions settle most of the decision.

1. Desktop encoder or browser studio? A desktop encoder (OBS, Streamlabs, vMix, Ecamm, PRISM) runs on your computer, uses your CPU and GPU, and records to your own drive. A browser studio (StreamYard, Restream Studio, Riverside) runs in a tab, makes guests painless, and does the mixing in the cloud. Gamers and anyone with complex scenes want an encoder. Interview shows usually want a browser studio.

2. Do you need to stream to more than one platform? YouTube itself does not multistream; its own help center tells you to use an encoder or a third-party relay. OBS needs a plugin. Everything else either includes it or sells it as an upgrade, and the destination count per plan is the number that moves you between tiers.

3. Where does the recording live, and for how long? This is the question vendors bury. Desktop tools write a file to your drive and that file is yours. Cloud studios keep recordings on their servers under retention rules: Restream deletes cloud recordings after 15 days on Standard and Professional and 30 days on Business, according to its help center, and StreamYard says free-plan recordings older than 12 months are permanently deleted. Your live audience is on rented platforms already. Don't rent the archive too.

Comparison table

Prices in USD, checked October 7, 2026. "Annual" means the per-month figure when billed yearly.

Solo streamer or gamer

You are the only person on screen, you have scenes (game capture, webcam, overlays) and you care about performance and alerts more than guest links.

OBS Studio: best free encoder

OBS Studio is the default for a reason: it is free, open source under the GPL, runs on Windows, macOS 13+ and Linux, and records to files on your own drive with no watermark. The project is actively maintained; version 32.2.2 is the current stable release and a 33.0 release candidate (RC1, October 9, 2026) was out, according to its GitHub releases page. The trade-off is that OBS gives you an engine, not a finished product. There are no built-in alerts, no tip jar and no multistreaming. To send one stream to several platforms you add a community plugin such as obs-multi-rtmp, or route through Restream. If you will do that work once, nothing else on this list gives you more control for less money. Skip it if you want guests to join from a link: OBS has no built-in guest feature, so pair it with a browser studio or use one of the tools below.

Streamlabs Desktop: best for alerts and widgets out of the box

Streamlabs Desktop is built on the OBS engine and adds the creator layer OBS leaves out: alerts, overlays, tipping and chat widgets, plus a themes library. Streamlabs states on its desktop app page that it "does not add watermarks or impose time limits on local recordings." It runs on Windows 10+ and macOS 12+, not Linux. The free version can stream one horizontal and one vertical output at the same time (Streamlabs calls this Dual Output), which covers a Twitch plus TikTok setup. Anything beyond that pair needs Streamlabs Ultra at $27 a month or $189 a year. Ultra adds more destinations (Streamlabs' desktop page says "3+", and its multistream guide describes up to five custom RTMP targets), multistream chat, 10 GB of cloud storage, and Collab Cam with up to 11 guests instead of one. We could not find an official hard cap on Ultra destinations. Pick Streamlabs if you stream on Twitch or YouTube and want the monetization widgets in one app. Skip it if you are on Linux or want a lean encoder.

PRISM Live Studio: best free encoder for phone-plus-desktop creators; multistreaming needs Plus

PRISM Live Studio, from Naver, is the quiet option many guides miss. It is free on Windows, Apple Silicon Macs, iOS and Android, it moved onto the OBS 31 engine in 2025, and its official Plus guide lists one streaming channel on the free plan and six on PRISM Plus, on both mobile and desktop. Desktop dual output (horizontal plus vertical) allows two channels free and six on Plus. So the free app is a solid single-destination encoder, and native multistreaming is a paid feature. Plus costs $9.99 a month or $79.99 a year (Apple App Store pricing), and the same guide lists ad, watermark and outro removal as Plus features for mobile (it lists only ad removal for desktop, so we could not confirm whether free desktop streams carry a watermark). Recording is local on desktop and mobile, and the PC app supports up to 4K60 output to YouTube per its FAQ. We found no remote-guest feature in its official documentation, so it is a solo tool. Intel Mac owners are out of luck: the Mac app requires Apple Silicon. PRISM fits a creator who streams a solo show from a phone and a laptop and wants a free encoder for both. If you want to multistream from it, budget for Plus at $79.99 a year, which can replace a monthly relay fee.

Interview or talk show with guests

Guests change everything. They need to join from a link, look and sound decent, and not need a tutorial. The recording also matters more, because you will cut clips and podcast episodes from it.

StreamYard: best browser studio for non-technical guests

StreamYard is the simplest way to put guests on a live show: send a link, they join in a browser, you click them on screen. The free plan allows six people on screen but shows the StreamYard logo, caps monthly streaming hours (the number appears only inside your account, not on a public page), and does not allow multistreaming, custom RTMP or downloading recordings. Core costs $44.99 a month or $35.99 a month billed annually and gets you three destinations, ten on-screen participants and auto-recording of streams up to 10 hours each. Local recording gives you separate audio and video files per participant, which is what an editor wants; 4K local tracks need Advanced ($88.99 monthly, $68.99 annual). Live output tops out at 1080p on every plan. One policy change to know: since December 2025 StreamYard moves accounts it considers commercial or multi-user to the Business plan ($299 monthly) at renewal, and company email domains must sign up for Business. If you are a solo creator, that does not apply; if you run a brand channel with a team, budget for it.

Riverside: best when the recording matters as much as the stream

Riverside started as a remote recording tool and still records like one: each participant is captured locally, up to 4K on desktop, with up to 10 people per session. Live streaming arrived later and sits on the Grow plan and up, at $45 a month or $34 a month billed annually per Riverside's pricing page (the cheaper Pro plan has no live streaming). On Grow you can stream at up to 1080p to unlimited destinations, including YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitch, X and Instagram, with custom RTMP, multi-aspect-ratio output and a combined chat Riverside calls Omnichat. Separate-track downloads are capped by hours per month (20 on Grow). Note that Riverside's pricing page FAQ still listed older prices ($29 and $39) when we checked, while the plan cards showed $35 and $45; we use the plan cards. Riverside fits podcasters who want to go live and walk away with podcast-grade files. It is more expensive than StreamYard Core for pure live work. See our Riverside vs SquadCast vs Zencastr comparison for the recording side.

Ecamm Live: best for Mac creators who want an app, not a tab

Ecamm Live is a Mac-only studio app (macOS 11.2 or newer) with scenes, overlays, screen sharing, a green screen and automatic recording to your own drive. Standard costs $16 a month billed annually ($192 a year) and includes multistreaming to ten destinations with no watermark. The guest feature, Interview mode, is a Pro feature at $32 a month billed annually ($384 a year), with up to ten guests on Apple Silicon Macs and four on Intel Macs, per Ecamm's support FAQ. Pro also adds 4K streaming, isolated audio and video tracks, NDI and a virtual camera for Zoom. Standard users get two hours to test Interview mode, and the free trial runs 14 days with all features. Billed monthly, Standard is $20 and Pro is $40, per Ecamm's pricing page toggle. Ecamm fits a Mac creator who wants OBS-level control with a friendlier interface and local files. Windows users should look at vMix or OBS instead.

vMix: best for pro productions on Windows, bought once

vMix is broadcast software, and its pricing reflects that it is meant to be owned rather than rented. Licenses are one-time: Basic HD $60 (four inputs, no vMix Call guests), HD $350, 4K $700 and Pro $1,200, with a MAX subscription at $50 a month. Every edition includes five simultaneous live streams, so multistreaming is built in, Guests join through vMix Call from a web browser; the purchase page lists no guests on Basic HD, one on HD, four on 4K and eight on Pro and MAX, and the vMix Call product page agrees. Two recorders writing to your own drive, plus the extra output bundle (external, fullscreen and virtual outputs), apply only to 4K and up; Basic HD and HD list a recording checkmark only. One-time licenses include 12 months of updates. vMix runs on Windows 10/11 only and does not support Apple Silicon Macs. There is a 60-day free trial. vMix is the right call for a creator running a produced weekly show with multiple cameras, instant replay or graphics, who is tired of subscription studios. It is overkill for a webcam and a guest.

Multistream to YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitch

You want one show in several places. The questions are how many destinations, whether chat comes back into one window, and whether you can keep using your own encoder.

Restream: best for multistreaming, including from OBS

RestreamAFFILIATE is the relay most creators end up using, because it works two ways: its own browser Studio, or as a destination for OBS, Streamlabs, vMix or any encoder. Its free plan multistreams to two channels, with Restream branding (a small watermark in Studio and/or a "Live with Restream" line in the stream description, per its help center). Paid plans scale by destination: Standard $19 a month or $190 a year (three channels), Professional $49 or $470 a year (five), Business $239 or $2,390 a year (eight). Cross-platform chat is included on every plan. The fine print: Studio streams at 720p on Free and Standard and 1080p from Professional, though streams from your own encoder have no resolution cap in Restream's comparison table. Cloud recordings are paid only and expire after 15 days (30 on Business), so download what you need. For the full head-to-head, read StreamYard vs Restream. Restream fits a creator who already likes OBS and wants a relay, or anyone who wants two platforms free.

StreamYard and Ecamm as multistream alternatives

StreamYard (three to ten destinations), Ecamm Standard (ten, Mac) and Riverside Grow (unlimited) all multistream too. If you only need horizontal plus vertical, Streamlabs' free Dual Output covers it, and YouTube can stream a horizontal and a vertical version of one stream natively, per its help center.

LinkedIn note: LinkedIn, not your streaming tool, decides who can go live there. We have not verified its current eligibility rules.

Webinars and selling live

A webinar is a livestream with a registration form, an email list at the end and a sales pitch in the middle. That list is the point: it is the one part of a live event you own.

StreamYard On-Air: best value for creator webinars

StreamYard's On-Air is a webinar page StreamYard hosts, which you can embed on your own site, with an optional registration form. It is included on Advanced ($88.99 monthly, $68.99 annual) for up to 100 viewers and on Business for 1,000 or more, per StreamYard's pricing page and help center. Business adds pre-recorded streams up to 8 hours that you can schedule 90 days ahead. For a creator selling a course or coaching program to a few hundred people, Advanced is the cheapest route to a branded webinar with registration among the tools here. You also keep everything else StreamYard does well: guests join from a link, you get eight multistream destinations on Advanced, so the same session can run on YouTube and LinkedIn while registrants watch on the On-Air page, and 4K local tracks for clips afterward. The limits to plan around: Advanced caps On-Air at 100 viewers, and teams selling under a company domain will be steered to Business by StreamYard's usage policy. Export your registrants and move them into your email platform the same day; see our sister site BestSends for email tools.

Riverside Webinar plan: best for webinars you also want to repurpose

Riverside's Webinar plan costs $99 a month or $79 a month billed annually and covers 100 registrants, with 10,000 on the custom-priced Business plan. It includes pre-recorded "stream as live" sessions, recurring webinars, Q&A and polls, and a HubSpot integration, per Riverside's pricing page. Because Riverside records each speaker locally, your webinar becomes clean source material for clips and a podcast episode. The Webinar plan raises separate-track downloads to 25 hours a month, up from 20 on Grow, and keeps Grow's live features: unlimited destinations, custom RTMP and combined chat. The "stream as live" option is the quiet win for creators who sell: record the best version of your pitch once, then run it on a schedule with live Q&A on top. It costs more than StreamYard Advanced, and 100 registrants is a low ceiling if your list is large, since the jump to 10,000 is a custom-priced Business plan. Choose it over StreamYard if repurposing is half the reason you run the event, or if you already record your podcast on Riverside and want one bill.

Restream webinars: an add-on, not a plan

Restream sells webinars as an add-on: $99 a month for 100 attendees, $299 a month for 500 on Business, and custom pricing up to 3,000, according to its webinars page. It includes registration with CSV export, polls and up to ten guests on stage. Registration CSV export matters more than it sounds: it is how attendees become email subscribers you own. Restream also says webinars can stream into Slack, which suits a creator running a paid community there. This only makes sense if you are already on Restream for multistreaming, because the add-on stacks on top of a paid plan. Example: Restream Standard ($19 a month, monthly billing) plus the $99 webinar add-on is $118 a month for 100 attendees, assuming list prices on October 10, 2026 and no other add-ons (Restream's pricing page shows the 100-attendee add-on on the Standard card and ties the 500-attendee tier to Business), versus $88.99 a month for StreamYard Advanced on monthly billing. If webinars are your main use, StreamYard costs less for the same 100-person audience. See our guide to monetizing expertise beyond brand deals and best tools for course creators for what to sell once people show up.

Not streaming, just recording your screen?

If you need tutorials or sponsor deliverables rather than a live show, you need a screen recorder. Prices checked October 7, 2026:

For the async-video side, read our Loom review and Loom alternatives.

Budget tiers

• $0: OBS Studio (solo), plus Restream Free if you want two platforms at once. Or PRISM Live Studio as a free single-destination encoder (multistreaming to up to six platforms needs PRISM Plus). StreamYard Free for a guest show with the logo on screen.
• Under $20 a month: Restream Standard ($19, three channels), Ecamm Live Standard ($16 billed annually, Mac, ten destinations), Streamlabs Ultra ($15.75 a month when billed $189 yearly), or vMix Basic HD at $60 once.
• $35 to $50 a month: StreamYard Core ($35.99 annual) for guest shows, Riverside Grow ($34 annual) for streaming plus studio-grade recording, Ecamm Pro ($32 billed annually) for Mac interview shows, Restream Professional ($49 monthly) for five channels at 1080p.
• Webinar budget, $69 to $99 a month: StreamYard Advanced ($68.99 annual) with On-Air, or Riverside Webinar ($79 annual).
• Own it outright: vMix HD ($350) or 4K ($700) for Windows productions you plan to run for years.

Example: a weekly one-hour interview show streamed to YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitch. Assumptions: three destinations, up to three guests, annual billing, list prices on October 7, 2026, no add-ons. StreamYard Core: $35.99 x 12 = $431.88 a year. Restream Standard: $190 a year, but Studio output is 720p and cloud recordings expire after 15 days. Riverside Grow: $34 x 12 = $408 a year, with local 4K guest tracks. Ecamm Pro (Mac only, needed for guests): $384 a year.

A simple live-show workflow

1. Plan the show and the clip. Decide the one moment you want to cut for Shorts and Reels before you go live.
2. Stream from one studio to every platform you need. Use the tool's chat aggregation so you are answering YouTube and LinkedIn comments in one place.
3. Record locally, every time. Turn on per-guest local recording before the session starts (StreamYard and Restream both require this) or let your desktop encoder write the file. Don't rely on the platform archive: YouTube warns that streams over 12 hours may not be archived at all.
4. Download within the retention window and edit. Pull files into DescriptAFFILIATE (our Descript review) or your editor of choice before any cloud deletion date.
5. Repurpose. Follow our guide to turning one video into a week of social content.
6. Capture the audience. End every stream with one call to action to your email list or free resource. Followers belong to the platform. Subscribers belong to you.