A round-the-clock stream is easy to start and hard to keep running. It rarely drops during the day; it drops at night, when nobody is watching. Here are the most common causes and what you can do about them.
Twitch ends every broadcast after 48 hours
According to Twitch’s broadcasting guidelines, a single broadcast lasts at most 48 hours. After that it ends, even if OBS keeps sending. For the channel to go live again, the encoder has to reconnect.
Do not rely on this happening by itself. Plan the restart yourself at a quiet time: stop the stream, wait a few seconds, start it again. That way the short gap lands where it bothers least.
Let OBS reconnect automatically
Short network dropouts are normal, and OBS can bridge them itself. In the settings under Advanced there is a section for automatic reconnecting:
- Enable it. Without this option OBS stops the stream at the first connection loss.
- Retry delay: a few seconds. Too short, and OBS retries before the router is back.
- Maximum retries: be generous. A router restart often takes longer than a minute or two.
If OBS gives up after the last retry, the stream stays off until someone restarts it. For true always-on operation you therefore also need something that starts the stream again (see below).
Windows: the most common overnight drops
- Update restarts: Windows likes to restart at night after updates. Set active hours to cover the night, or pause updates and install them on schedule.
- Power saving: turn off sleep and hibernation. The display turning off is not a problem.
- USB power saving: Windows may put capture cards and USB audio to sleep. Disable USB selective suspend in the power options.
- Driver updates: do not let graphics drivers update automatically. An update mid-stream briefly resets the GPU, and OBS loses its preview or crashes.
- Antivirus: schedule large scans for a time when a brief stutter does not matter.
Sort out the rights to your content
Always-on streams often show old recordings, YouTube videos or music. Only broadcast what you have the rights to. Third-party music risks DMCA notices, and repeated violations can get the channel banned. Your own recordings are usually fine, as long as no third-party music plays in them.
Monitor instead of hoping
- Offline alerts: a Discord bot or webhook that reports when the channel goes offline is the cheapest insurance.
- Check the connection: Twitch Inspector shows bitrate and drops of your broadcast. A test run before the first always-on session pays off.
- Read the logs: OBS writes a log file for each session (Help → Log Files). After a drop it usually tells you whether the network, the GPU or a plugin was to blame.
If the stream drops anyway: restart it automatically
OBS itself does not restart a stream once reconnecting has finally failed or someone hit Stop by accident. A bot that controls the playlist can take over: it checks whether the stream is running at every video change and starts it if not. If it is already running, nothing happens.
That is how the StreamWizard OBS plugin works, for example, but only after you have started the bot. A plugin that starts broadcasting on its own as soon as someone opens OBS would be an unpleasant surprise.
Checklist for always-on operation
- Automatic reconnect in OBS enabled, with generous retries?
- Planned restart before 48 hours are up?
- Windows updates, power saving and USB power saving under control?
- Only content you have the rights to?
- Alert when the channel goes offline?
- Something that restarts the stream after a final drop?