How to run your podcast as a 24/7 live stream on YouTube

RSS upload or a 24/7 stream: what each one does

YouTube already has a way in for audio-first shows. According to YouTube Help, when you submit your RSS feed, "YouTube will create videos for each podcast episode that you choose to upload", using "your podcast's show art to create a static-image video". New episodes upload automatically. The feature is "available in select countries/regions", and it does not notify subscribers about back-catalogue episodes.

That gives you a library: one video per episode, found through search and recommendations. A 24/7 live stream is a different object. It is a single broadcast that is always on, so a listener can drop in at any time, as they would with a radio station, and the stream shows up wherever YouTube surfaces live content.

The two do not compete. The episode videos are the archive; the stream is the always-on front door that points to it. If you only want your episodes on YouTube, RSS ingestion alone is the simpler answer.

Before you build it: ads, sponsors and music

A back catalogue was edited for a podcast app, not for YouTube, and three things in it can cause trouble.

• Baked-in ads. On RSS uploads, YouTube says that to comply with its Terms of Service, "podcast content you upload to YouTube cannot contain advertisements". Use the clean masters, not the files with inserted ad breaks, for the stream as well.
• Host-read sponsor spots. If your podcast includes branded content, YouTube says "you're required to let us know". Declare them on the stream too, or cut the reads from old episodes, since those deals have often ended.
• Music. YouTube says "All live streams are scanned for matches to third-party content". A licensed intro theme can still match: YouTube warns that "your live stream can be interrupted even if you've licensed the third-party content" unless the owner has allowlisted your channel. Check what your theme licence says about YouTube and live streaming; our guide to music licenses for 24/7 streams shows what to look for.

Guests and co-hosts agreed to a podcast, so if any of them are sensitive about video platforms, ask before their episodes go into a stream that runs on YouTube around the clock.

Build the episode reel

The stream needs a video, and for a podcast the picture can be a still: your show art at 1280 by 720 or 1920 by 1080. List the episodes in play order in a text file:

file 'ep001.mp3'
file 'ep002.mp3'
file 'ep003.mp3'

Then join them under the show art in one pass. The loudnorm filter evens out the volume between old and new episodes, so a quiet early season does not follow a loud recent one:

ffmpeg -loop 1 -framerate 30 -i show-art.png \
  -f concat -safe 0 -i episodes.txt \
  -map 0:v -map 1:a -c:v libx264 -preset veryfast -tune stillimage \
  -crf 28 -g 60 -pix_fmt yuv420p \
  -af loudnorm=I=-16:TP=-1.5:LRA=11 \
  -c:a aac -b:a 128k -ar 44100 -shortest -movflags +faststart \
  podcast-reel.mp4

We tested it on our server on October 27, 2026, with ffmpeg 7.0.2 and three test episodes. The output was H.264 at 30 frames per second with a keyframe every 2 seconds, AAC audio at 44.1 kHz, and an integrated loudness of -15.8 LUFS against the -16 target. The concat method needs episodes in the same format (all MP3 at the same sample rate, for example); convert any odd ones first.

A still image costs almost nothing to encode. The test reel came out at 147 kbps in total, about 66 MB per hour of audio:

To add a list of what plays when, which is useful for the stream description or a pinned comment, add up the episode lengths with ffprobe as you build the list. Note that a still-image reel is fine to stream but is a light file: if you send it to YouTube yourself, encode the live output at YouTube's bitrate for your resolution, as in our radio station guide.

Keep it running and keep it fresh

A loop is only as reliable as the machine that sends it. OBS on a home computer stops with the next update or router restart. A rented server running ffmpeg with -stream_loop -1 works, but you then look after the server and the restarts. YouTube also limits what it keeps: "If your stream exceeds 12 hours, it may not be captured at all", so treat the stream as a broadcast, not as storage, and our guide to the YouTube live stream time limit explains the rest.

To keep the stream from feeling like the same day on repeat:

• Rebuild the reel when a new episode comes out, or every few weeks, so the newest episode is always in it.
• Rotate by theme: a "best of" reel for the weekday, a full season at the weekend.
• Put the episode list and links to the full videos or your podcast feed in the description, so listeners who arrive mid-episode can find the start.

To go live at all, YouTube says you need "no live streaming restrictions in the past 90 days" and need to verify your channel. Monetization is a separate question: YouTube does not pay for content that is "mass-produced, generic, repetitive", and a reel of real episodes is the opposite of that, but our guide to the inauthentic content rule covers where the line is.

Run the reel without a server

Short daily shows and briefings

We started in 2019 as a tool for publishing short daily audio briefings to smart speakers, and the same idea applies to a daily show today. A five-minute briefing is too short to loop on its own, but a week of them, or a rolling archive with the newest one first, makes a reel that tells a new listener what the show sounds like. Date each one out loud or on the image, so nobody mistakes last week's news for today's.

Before you go live

1. The reel uses clean masters: no inserted ad breaks, and sponsor reads cut or declared.
2. Your intro, outro and any music beds are licensed for YouTube and live streaming, or are your own.
3. Guests who might object know their episodes will run on the stream.
4. The reel is 1280 by 720 or larger, with a keyframe every 2 seconds and AAC audio at 44.1 kHz.
5. The description lists the episodes and links to the full videos or your feed.
6. The stream runs from a server or a hosted service, and the stream key is stored like a password.

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