When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Best Streaming Platforms for Gaming
Live streaming is the best thing that has ever happened in the gaming world right now.
It lets gamers share their wins and battles as well as their funny, epic fail moments with an interactive audience. It lets you build community and gain friends, you can even make a living out of it.
There’s a digital world for gamers out there, each offering you tons and endless opportunities, but which one, out of all these platforms, should you call home?
TWITCH
The ever-so-popular and the most prominent streaming platform is Twitch. It’s like YouTube for live streaming. If you open up YouTube, you’ll see many video content.
On Twitch, you’ll see live-streaming content.
It is, until now, the best platform for streaming, and it’s not just for gaming. You’ve read that right.
Usually, when you hear the word Twitch, you’ll think of video gaming, but there are already quite a few successful non-gaming-related streams on Twitch, such as NASA, Mirggles, Cnotbusch and more.
Twitch is free to use, they have a very good, well-organized user interface.
Their website is robust, it has detailed analytics of your live views, subscribers, revenues, top clips, etc. Currently, Twitch has 7+ Million users worldwide, and if you’re a beginner, it might be a bit hard for you to build an audience.
Twitch doesn’t promote new users, so you’ll be on your own for a while. Also, they seem to have the worst monetization feature. You first need to be an affiliate, then you’ll be able to monetize your content.
Once you’re an affiliate, viewers can subscribe to your channel. One subscription is equivalent to $4.99 a month; however, streamers only get half of that.
But then again, Twitch is the leading platform, and if you’ve managed to successfully get a ranking out of all its millions of users, that would be a big achievement in the entire live stream & gaming community.
DLive
The world’s first and largest streaming platform on the blockchain, a relatively new platform that started in 2017.
The platform uses its currency system and doesn’t take a sizable cut of the revenue generated by streamers.
In 2019, A Pro Gamer and one of YouTube’s best creators, PewDiePie supported DLive and had weekly streams on the platform.
The Interface is clean, and the browse menu is organized based on what game is being played. If you select League of Legends, you’ll see all streamers playing that game.
It has a range of categories for streaming. eSports is divided into various games such as Counter-Strike, GTA, DOTA 2, and many others.
There is also streaming for music, news, and other broadcasts. DLive is also available for iOS and Android users.
Unlike Twitch, which keeps 50% of channel subscription revenue, DLive takes no cut of the revenue gained by streamers through subscriptions or digital donations.
The platform says it gives 90.1% of all subscription and gift revenue directly to the creators, and the remaining 9.9 percent will be awarded to the most engaged users.
YOUTUBE GAMING
It is the biggest video-sharing platform on the internet. It’s where almost all video creators are. All types of vloggers can be found or started on YouTube.
In 2008, YouTube opened its doors to live streamers. But, unlike streaming platforms, YouTube seems to lean more toward video content than streaming content.
If you open YouTube, most likely, you will see vlogs. The platform doesn’t make it easy enough to promote its streamers or to help viewers find live streams in a sea of pre-recorded videos.
However, it’s fairly easy to stream and upload videos on YouTube. The interface is simple to understand and use.
The cool thing about streaming on YouTube is that your video is already uploaded when you’re done, and even if viewers tune in late, they can rewind and watch.
With Google AdSense, new users can monetize their streams. If you want better monetization, you’ll need to be a YouTube partner. You’ll need at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 views to join the program.
GOSUGAMERS
A global gaming community that focuses on high-quality eSports content, like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, Hearthstone, Overwatch, League of Legends and StarCraft II.
It’s a competitive platform that has scheduled tournaments and matches for its users, and features gamers from many countries from around the world and has a Global Ranking out of all the gamers.
GosuGamers users are awarded 50 units of site currency that they can use to bet on their favorite eSports competitors. The platform also offers the latest news from the eSports community.
This is a great destination for competitive gamers and eSports enthusiasts.
FACEBOOK GAMING
Live streaming games on Facebook is as easy as live streaming on your account. Setting your page to Gamer Content Creator is as easy as pressing the like button.
However, Facebook has an immense of different content within the app.
People scroll endlessly on Facebook, and chances are they will come across your video, and it will play automatically. In terms of reach, Facebook is the one.
If on YouTube or Twitch, it would be a bit hard for you to be discovered. On Facebook, if someone shares your video, it will be shared on their timeline and will be seen by their connections.
These are their friends, family, coworkers, etc. and these connections will be able to see your stream or content on their timeline and can be potential viewers and subscribers.
It will spread like wildfire. Videos could become viral instantly. However, it wouldn’t compare to being a known creator over at YouTube or on Twitch.
Monetization on Facebook Gaming works like this: Viewers can support their favorite streamers by giving them stars; each star is worth 1 cent.
Once you reach the Partner level, not only do you still have access to stars but now viewers can subscribe to your channel at $4.99 a month.
Becoming a Partner on Facebook doesn’t have clear statistics; Facebook will just reach out to you if they think you should join the program.
Live Streaming in general, is not just sitting on your chair and going live, waiting for things to happen. It’s a lot of hard work and would require time and dedication from you.
But if gaming is your passion, this will be a lot of fun and could be potentially lucrative.
Whichever platform you choose to start on, never forget to always have fun. You’re entering a gaming community anyway; what’s not fun about that?
See Also
Best Gaming Laptops Under 1500