Configure Your Stream Key and First Stream

Any piece of software you're already using for live streaming is likely compatible with Owncast. Visit our broadcasting software page to see some specific pieces of software and how they're configured.

The admin interface can be found by navigating to /admin on your Owncast server (e.g., https://owncast.example.com/admin).

Configuring your broadcasting software to stream to your Owncast server requires you to use the /live endpoint along with providing the stream key. (e.g., rtmp://owncast.example.com/live with stream key abc123). If your software does not allow specifying the stream key separately, you may need to append it to the URL as rtmp://owncast.example.com/live/abc123.

Default credentials

Default	Value
Admin username	admin
Admin password	abc123
Stream key	abc123

These are the default credentials for logging into the Owncast admin interface and streaming to your Owncast server. It is highly recommended that you change these values immediately after your first login to ensure the security of your server.

Next steps

1. Point your broadcasting software at your new server using rtmp://yourserver/live with your stream key. If your software doesn't have a way to specify a stream key use the url rtmp://yourserver/live/streamkey and use your stream key instead.
2. Access your server in your web browser by visiting http://yourserver:8080.
3. You can visit the Admin dashboard at http://yourserver:8080/admin where you can check visitor and server stats, change your stream key, personalize the content displayed on your page, and more. To login, use admin and the stream key as the password.

Note: Your stream key is only used by your streaming software to publish video; it is not your admin password.

Stream Key

To begin streaming you'll first need your stream key and the RTMP URL of your Owncast server. Out of the box your stream key is the same as the admin password: abc123. You'll want to change these both as soon as possible.

Beginning with Owncast v0.1.0 the admin password and stream keys are managed independently, allowing you to add as many stream keys as you'd like.

While most people won't require having multiple stream keys, there are some specific scenarios where having this ability may be helpful.

In the admin server setup page you can add and remove these keys.

Admin

Some common items many people would want to update after installing Owncast are:

• Your site name, logo, description and external links that are displayed on the web site.
• The stream key to gain access to broadcasting to your stream and your admin.
• Enable your stream to show up in the Owncast Directory.

Read more about what you can configure and how.