Twitch streaming is getting a huge upgrade this year thanks to NVIDIA. Enhanced Broadcasting is rolling out for some Twitch users very soon, and streams will look better than ever thanks to NVIDIA’s new quality options.
The feature set is currently in beta and will only be available for select Twitch streamers before it’s fully rolled out as a full release sometime in the future, but things are already looking bright. New OBS features will make scaling your stream easier than ever, and Twitch viewers will be treated to higher resolutions at no cost.
How to Sign Up for Twitch Enhanced Broadcasting
To get Enhanced Broadcasting for your Twitch channel, all you need to do is sign up for the beta on your Twitch dashboard. After that, it’s just a matter of getting chosen. This is rolling out in a very limited capacity for now, so you might not get in at all.
Also, you’ll need an NVIDIA graphics card to be eligible since this whole thing is powered by NVIDIA. Sorry, AMD and Intel users. Hopefully, things will open up later down the line, but it’s restricted to Team Green for now.
Related: Why was PewDiePie banned from Twitch? Answered
What Does Enhanced Broadcasting Do on Twitch?
There are two key features that Enhanced Broadcasting brings to the table for both Twitch streamers and viewers. The first major addition is 4K encoding, which will let you stream in 2160p and watch eligible streams in 4K if they’re outputting it. This feature is even available for non-partners on Twitch, which is a huge quality-of-life improvement for smaller streamers.
The second key addition is support for multiple encodes of a single live stream. A single NVIDIA GPU will be able to power several concurrent streams of differing quality levels simultaneously, making streams more scalable than ever before. Viewers can already choose their resolution when watching streams, but having multiple encodes means that different resolutions will look much better than before. This will also result in reduced latency overall.
Because your NVIDIA GPU will handle all the heavy lifting, OBS will now have an automatic configuration that chooses the best quality settings for your hardware and bandwidth. Fiddling with OBS settings is a nightmare for most streamers, so if this is as straightforward as Twitch and NVIDIA claim, it would be a huge improvement.
Once the beta for Enhanced Broadcasting finishes, these features will be rolled into the next mainline version of OBS for all streamers to enjoy. Viewers don’t have to change anything to take advantage of the new quality improvements, so keep watching your favorite channels and don’t worry about it too much. Hopefully, these new changes won’t result in too many new Twitch error codes.
