Why use the managed connection
With a managed connection, Streamloop talks to YouTube through the official YouTube API, so it can:- Create and run the broadcast for you — no copying stream keys.
- Let you set the title, description, privacy, thumbnail, and schedule from inside Streamloop.
- Keep the YouTube broadcast in sync if you reschedule or stop the loop.
Connect your channel
Open the destination picker
In your loop’s General tab, find the destination section and click Connect a destination.
Choose YouTube (Connect channel)
In the provider grid, pick YouTube · Connect channel (marked recommended). This starts
Google sign-in.
Sign in and grant access
Complete the Google popup. On the consent screen, leave every box checked — including the
YouTube permission.
Set up the broadcast
Once a YouTube channel is connected, the loop’s YouTube tab unlocks. From there you control how the broadcast appears on your channel:- Title, description, category, language, and tags.
- Visibility — Public, Unlisted, or Private.
- Thumbnail — automatic (the first frame of your video) or a custom image.
- Recording and DVR, plus a latency mode (normal, low, or ultra-low).
- Publish upcoming broadcast on YouTube when scheduled — when on, scheduling the loop also creates the upcoming broadcast on your channel and keeps it in sync.
- Ad frequency — let YouTube run automatic mid-roll ads on the broadcast (see below).
Automatic mid-roll ads
In the loop’s YouTube tab, Ad frequency sets how often YouTube inserts automatic mid-roll ads during the broadcast. Streamloop sends the cadence to YouTube once when the broadcast is provisioned, and YouTube itself places the ads on that schedule — there is no self-run timer and you don’t pick individual ad breaks. Pick one of four tiers:| Tier | What it does |
|---|---|
| Off | No automatic mid-roll ads. Pre-roll and any manual breaks still follow your YouTube settings. |
| Conservative | Roughly one break every 30 minutes. |
| Balanced | Roughly one break every 18 minutes. |
| Aggressive | Roughly one break every 6 minutes (YouTube’s tightest cadence). |
YouTube Partner Program is required
Automatic mid-roll ads only work on channels enrolled in the YouTube Partner Program (YPP). On channels that aren’t monetization-eligible, the Ad frequency control is hidden or disabled and Streamloop skips the cuepoint schedule write — YouTube rejects monetization changes on non-YPP channels. Streamloop reads your channel’s YPP status from the cached YouTube channel metadata, which is refreshed in the background and can be up to 24 hours stale. If your channel was just accepted into YPP and the toggle still hasn’t appeared, wait for the next refresh or reconnect the channel to pull it immediately.Soft-fail behavior
The ad-schedule write to YouTube is best-effort: if YouTube rejects the cuepoint update (for example, the channel lost monetization between refreshes), the broadcast still goes live. The failure is recorded against the destination but doesn’t block the stream and doesn’t disconnect your channel.Automatic mid-roll ads are only available on the managed YouTube connection. The
stream key path doesn’t support this — set ad breaks in YouTube
Studio on the broadcast you created there.
Reconnect when access expires
If Google’s authorization expires, the destination shows YouTube needs reauthorization. Click Reconnect and complete sign-in again to keep streaming. Your stream keys and authorization are encrypted at rest.Managed connection vs stream key
| Managed connection | Stream key | |
|---|---|---|
| Setup | Sign in with Google once | Paste a key from YouTube |
| Broadcast created by | Streamloop | You, in YouTube Studio |
| Title / privacy / thumbnail | Set in Streamloop | Set in YouTube Studio |
| Schedule synced to YouTube | Yes | No |
Ready to go live? Connect your channel on streamloop.app, or follow the
quickstart.