YouTube bitrate dropping to 160 kb/s while streaming.
I've been encountering an issue, that's just essentially the title. What happens is that I'd be streaming fine to YouTube and at random moments it would drop to the bitrate noted above.
Normally I'd assume it's my internet messing up, but I multistream to Twitch, and that doesn't drop at all, and I can at least confirm that with all the streams I've done when this issue occurs. I would normally restart the stream, but since I stream to YouTube first and Twitch second, ending the stream ends it on both YouTube and Twitch's end
The only inkling I've found had to some potential solution is that YouTube is having some issues encoding AV1 live from what I saw on Reddit, but I'm a bit stumped on how to trouble shoot it. I'll post my OBS logs, and Setup shortly.
8 Replies
Log of Yesterday's Stream when it happened last, I'm also checking other streams that it occured to see if there's any similarities.
https://obsproject.com/logs/rj1VaBSkwnjIg23d
to troubleshoot the AV1 live thing you mentioned just dont use av1 for a stream to see if it happens to help rule that issue out. But this looks like a dropped frames issue which is network specific so part of me has doubts about the av1 part but hey never know until you try.
Yeah I'm gonna give HEVC a go instead, and if that's no good then I might have to call my ISP tomorrow.
You have a lot of dropped frames, which are specifically due to some networking issues. Either your connection to YouTube is unstable, or there's an issue on YouTube's end. It won't have anything to do with AV1 encoding
Here's the general guidance on fixing those issues: https://obsproject.com/wiki/Dropped-Frames-and-General-Connection-Issues
Also according to the log you're on OBS 30 and there have been a few patches since then leading to 30.0.2 so I'd recommend updating
Looks like the YT stream is using ipv6. Try changing this and testing again
IPv6 would be a problem. I don’t have one. Only a static v4
Update -
Unfortuantely making it IPv4 didn't fix the issue. It was super weird because I know I've tried a few things that were on the troubleshooting list.
1. Changing the bitrate doesn't change the drop at all. Once it drops to 160 kb/s it'll remain at that rate for the rest of the stream. It still occurs completely at random, so I can't really predict when it'll happen, just if it'll happen.
2. I'm more likely to think that it's my connection to YT that's messed up but I'm not quite sure why? Thinking about quickly seeing router settings later.
3. I wasn't able to test swapping encoders yet because I have to rethink my whole multistreaming setup lol. I stream 4k to YT, 720p to Twitch, and record in 4k. Whenever I tried to switch YouTube to HEVC for ex, it would start overloading my encoder. (I'll see if i have an OBS log of what I mean).
Update to the update
1. Looking more like I gotta talk to my ISP to see what's up? Everywhere online I looked pointed to either AV1 or my network stability to YT being the issue. So I'll call them when I have a moment two, probably Friday.
2. Swapping to HEVC was a lot more work than I thought for me, might need some assistance in delegating everything correctly.
(Pretty sure doing HEVC streaming to YT, AV1 recording, and H264 streaming to Twitch altogether was a bad idea, but when I swapped any of them to x264, i still get encoding overload, so I don't think I can do HEVC + AV1 together, they both have to be the same one?)
3. I could just start purely streaming to 1 platform till I can resolve this but that's a bit of a demotivator lol, but not sure where else i can trouble shoot for now
Edit - totally forgot about other multistreaming alternatives 
I'm sorry for the spaced updates, but because I record and Stream to 2 places. AV1 is the only encoder that's currently operating with the load im putting on the PC. To be honest I'm not entirely sure why, I've tried
Twitch - Always H264
YT - HEVC
Record - HEVC
YT - AV1
Record - HEVC
YT - HEVC
Record - AV1
and I've just ran into Encoder overloading in both cases, so I have to use AV1 for both if I stream to 2 spots and record. So unless if I use something like Restream I might be SOL on this issue for the time being.
At least until I can call my ISP, but personal life is in the way at the moment
I'm sorry for the spaced updates, but because I record and Stream to 2 places. AV1 is the only encoder that's currently operating with the load im putting on the PC. To be honest I'm not entirely sure why, I've tried
Twitch - Always H264
YT - HEVC
Record - HEVC
YT - AV1
Record - HEVC
YT - HEVC
Record - AV1
and I've just ran into Encoder overloading in both cases, so I have to use AV1 for both if I stream to 2 spots and record. So unless if I use something like Restream I might be SOL on this issue for the time being.
At least until I can call my ISP, but personal life is in the way at the moment