Google Meet meetings can be Livestream on YouTube.

More than two years into the pandemic, as video calls have taken over workspaces, Google Meet is now rolling out the ability to live stream meetings on YouTube.

Moreover, it could open them up to viewers more quickly than the old live-streaming events through Meet.

Google Workplace admins can opt into public streaming for the business accounts they manage, including a few guardrails to ensure your weekly standup doesn't turn into an open mic.

The feature is available to most paid Workplace accounts: Enterprise tiers (starter, standard, and), Education Plus, Teaching and Learning upgrade, Workplace individual subscribers, and Google One Premium plan members in certain countries. However, people on the most starter, basic, legacy, or essentials packages do not have access.

If you want to Livestream a Google Meet session on YouTube, you'll have to put in a request in advance to have your YouTube channel approved. The approval process can take up to 24 hours. Users who need to change how long streams can be and for how long can do so in their privacy settings, and a complete list of what's required to get the streams going is available on this support page.

Google Meet has had a lot of changes this year — including combining Google Duo into a single hub for voice and video calls.

In June 2021, an update for teachers on Google Meet mentioned the ability to stream events like school board meetings on YouTube, and now it is becoming widely available (it could take up to a couple of weeks to become available for eligible accounts).

Other features mentioned, like improvements for breakout rooms and a "video lock" that allows hosts to turn off everyone's videos at once or mute everyone, have rolled out since then.

In March, Google introduced small but valuable changes like picture-in-picture and emoji. In addition, Google Meet's interface refresh brought an easy shortcut to avoid seeing your face the entire time, methods for pinning and unpinning content, and a single bar to contain all of Meet's controls.

Google Meet (previously known as Hangouts Meet) is video-communication assistance developed by Google. It is one of two apps that include the replacement for Google Hangouts, the other being Google Chat. It is also set to substitute the consumer-facing Google Duo on mobile devices.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the benefit of Meet grew by 30 between January and April 2020, with 100M users a day accessing Meet, compared to 200 million daily uses for Zoom as of the last week of April 2020.

After being invite-only and calmly releasing an iOS app in February 2017, Google formally pitched Meet in March 2017. The service was revealed as a video conferencing app for up to 30 players, described as an enterprise-friendly rendition of Hangouts. It has projected with a web app, an Android app, and an iOS app.

While Google Meet introduced the above features to upgrade the original Hangouts application, some standard Hangouts features were deprecated, including viewing attendees and chatting simultaneously. The number of video feeds permitted at one time was also decreased to 8, prioritizing those attendees who most recently used their microphones.

Additionally, features such as the chatbox were modified to overlay the video feeds rather than resizing the latter to confirm. Hangouts were scheduled to cease operation in the first half of 2021. In addition, Google suspended its usual 60-minute limit for unpaid accounts.

In August 2020, Google was planning to eventually merge Google Duo with the business-oriented Google Meet. In December 2021, this objective was dropped, but Duo remained available and updated.

Then, in June 2022, Google reversed course and declared that Duo would be merged into Meet. As a result, the mobile app will be rebranded as "Google Meet," while the original Meet app will eventually be deprecated.

Four ways to live stream on YouTube

Live stream on YouTube: Web browser

A webcam might satisfy your needs if all you desire to do is share your ideas and engage with your audience in real-time. It's also possible to live stream via your browser with a higher-end camera like a digital camcorder or DSLR. You'll require a USB capture card to get the video signal into your computer. Then YouTube can identify the camera as if it were a plug-and-play webcam. Once you're all charged with a camera, here's how to live stream on YouTube via web browser:

• Log in to your YouTube account and tap the "Create a video or post" button on the top-right edge of the screen.
• Choose "Go Live" from the drop-down menu.
• Select to go live right now or at a later date.
• Choose "Built-in webcam" as the type of stream.
• If prompted, provide YouTube and your browser any needed permissions for live streaming.
• Edit the details of your event, configure the engagement features to your liking, and choose a Visibility alternative (public, unlisted, or private) if you're planning to stream later rather than now. Finally, set a time and date for your stream to initiate.
• Preview your stream settings, providing the proper webcam and microphone are set.
• Hit "Go Live."

That's it. Remember to push "End Stream" when you're finished. YouTube will automatically upload an on-demand live stream version to your channel so viewers who skipped it can play it back. You can see and handle all your scheduled and past live streams in the "Live" tab under "Content" in YouTube Studio.

How to live stream on YouTube: Mobile

Once you've smashed the subscriber threshold, live streaming to YouTube on a mobile device is relatively simple:

• First, download the YouTube app.
• Next, open the app and press the plus icon in the middle of the bottom menu.
• Finally, select "Go Live."
• Give all the permissions to YouTube, which requires live streaming.
• Use the camera icon in the top-right to flip between your device's front- and back-facing cameras.
• Set a title for your stream, configure privacy settings, restrict your audience, etc.
• If you don't plan to stream now, press "More options" to schedule a time for the live stream.
• Enter "Advanced settings" to switch live chat, monetization, and more.
• Press "Next" and take a photo for your live stream thumbnail or upload an existing one from your phone's storage.
• Choose to stream in landscape (rotate your device) or portrait (select "Stream in the portrait" at the bottom) to go live.
• Now you're ready for some untethered live streaming. When you're done, hit "Finish" and "OK" to end the stream. A recording of your live stream will appear on your channel after. You can access and manage that recording and others through the "My Videos" page within the "Library" tab.

How to live stream on YouTube: Software encoder

While the exact process of live streaming on YouTube with a software encoder will depend on the streaming software you're using, it should look something like this:

• First, download and install your preferred streaming software.
• Then, on YouTube, click the camera icon in the top-right corner of the screen and select "Go Live."
• In YouTube Studio, click "Stream" in the left-hand navigation bar if you're ready to go live. To schedule a stream for later, select "Manage" instead and hit "Schedule stream" in the top-right corner and fill out your event details.
• Click the "Edit" button to the right of your steam preview and info to review or customize
• your stream title, add a description, choose a privacy setting, upload a thumbnail, and more. Then, in the "Edit settings" pop-up, enter the "Customization" submenu from the pane on the left for more options.
• Copy the "Stream key" under "Stream Settings." (Keep this string of characters private.)
• Open your streaming software and paste the "Stream name/key" and, if required, the "Stream URL" from YouTube in the appropriate fields. You'll probably find these within a settings or preferences menu; refer to the software's user documentation if unsure where to look.

YouTube to streaming software

Start the stream via your streaming software to go live on YouTube. If it's a scheduled event, hit the "Go live" button in the top-right corner of the screen when the time comes.

End your stream through the streaming software once the show's over. A recording will automatically upload to your channel so people can watch it on demand. View and manage all your current, scheduled, and past live streams through the "Manage" submenu in YouTube Studio.