Broadcasting

To broadcast a live video, you must first create a LiveVideo object. The LiveVideo object represents the broadcast, and you can manipulate the object's properties to control the broadcast's settings. Upon creation, the API will return the LiveVideo object's ID and a stream URL, which you can pass to your encoder and use to stream data to the LiveVideo object.

Broadcast on a User

To broadcast on a User object, get a User access token with the publish_video permission and send a request to:

POST /<USER_ID>/live_videos?status=LIVE_NOW

Refer to the /live_videos edge reference to see additional query string parameters you can include to describe the broadcast, such as a title and description.

Upon success, the API will create a LiveVideo object on the User and return a secure_stream_url and the LiveVideo object's id. The broadcast will appear in a post on the User's profile as soon as you send data to the secure stream URL. You can query the LiveVideo object to monitor the broadcast's health and to end the broadcast.

Sample Request

curl -i -X POST \
 "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<USER_ID>/live_videos
   ?status=LIVE_NOW
   &title=Today%27s%20Live%20Video
   &description=This%20is%20the%20live%20video%20for%20today."

Sample Response

{
  "id": "1953020644813104",      //<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>
  "stream_url": "rtmp://rtmp-api.facebook...",
  "secure_stream_url":"rtmps://rtmp-api.facebook..."
}

Broadcast on a Page

To broadcast a live video on a Page, get a Page access token of an admin of the Page with the pages_read_engagement and pages_manage_posts permissions, then send a request to:

POST /<PAGE_ID>/live_videos?status=LIVE_NOW

Refer to the /live_videos edge reference to see additional query string parameters you can include to describe the broadcast, such as a title and description.

Upon success, the API will create a LiveVideo object on the Page and return a secure_stream_url and the LiveVideo object's id. The broadcast will appear in a post on the Page as soon as you send data to the secure stream URL. You can query the LiveVideo object to monitor the broadcast's health and to end the broadcast.

Sample Request

curl -i -X POST \
  "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<PAGE_ID>/live_videos
    ?status=LIVE_NOW
    &title=Today%27s%20Page%20Live%20Video
    &description=This%20is%20the%20live%20video%20for%20the%20Page%20for%20today"

Sample Response

{
  "id": "1953020644813108",     //<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>
  "stream_url": "rtmp://rtmp-api.facebook...",
  "secure_stream_url":"rtmps://rtmp-api.facebook..."
}

Get Broadcast Stream Data

You can read a LiveVideo object to get the broadcast stream's preview URLs and data on streaming health, such as bitrates and framerates. Stream health data refreshes every 2 seconds, so limit queries to no more than once every 2 seconds. A stream timeout will be detected and reported after 4 seconds of no data being received.

To read a LiveVideo object, get an appropriate User or Page access token with the publish_video permission, then send a query to:

GET /<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?fields=<COMMA_SEPARATED_LIST_OF_FIELDS>

Use the {fields} parameter to specify the LiveVideo object fields you want returned. For example, here's a request to get the ingest_streams on the LiveVideo object, which includes data about stream health:

Sample Request

curl -i -X GET \
  "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?fields=ingest_streams"

Sample Response

{
  "ingest_streams": [
    {
      "stream_id": "0",
      "stream_url": "rtmp://rtmp-api.facebook...",
      "secure_stream_url": "rtmps://rtmp-api.facebook...",
      "is_master": true,
      "stream_health": {
        "video_bitrate": 4024116,
        "video_framerate": 60,
        "video_gop_size": 2000,
        "video_height": 720,
        "video_width": 1280,
        "audio_bitrate": 128745.4921875
      },
      "id": "1914910145231512"  // <INGEST_STREAM_ID>
    }
  ],
  "id": "<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>" 
}

Response Properties

End a Broadcast

To end a broadcast, stop streaming live video data from your encoder to the stream URL or send a request to:

POST /<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?end_live_video=true

This sets the LiveVideo object's status to VOD and saves it as a video-on-demand (VOD) so it can be viewed later.

Upon success, the API will return the LiveVideo object's ID.

Sample Request

curl -i -X POST \
  "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?end_live_video=true"

Sample Response

{
  "id": "10213570560993813"  //<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>
}

You can perform a GET operation on the LiveVideo ID to confirm that its status has been set to VOD:

GET /<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?fields=status

Sample Response

{
  "status": "VOD",  // Broadcast ended, saved as VOD
  "id": "10213570560993813"    //<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>
}

Delete a Broadcast

To delete a broadcast that has ended and saved as a VOD, send a request to:

DELETE /<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>

Sample Request

curl -i -X DELETE \
 "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>"

Sample Response

{
  success: true
}

Frame-Accurate Go-Live

There can be a slight delay before a broadcast goes live while we decode its initial streaming data and process any associated API requests. This can make it difficult for on-air talent to know exactly when a broadcast has started. To avoid this problem, LiveVideo objects can be set to accept streaming data but to not go live to audiences until a go-live RTMP message is detected within the streaming data itself. This allows anyone who is able to preview a broadcast to see it, while allowing the streaming encoder to precisely control both the time at which the broadcast goes live for an audience and the first frame that the audience sees.

To enable frame-accurate go-live, first create a LiveVideo object as you normally would and set its status to PREVIEW. Once it has been created, query the LiveVideo object and request the secure_stream_url field with the following nested fields:

secure_stream_url.inband_go_live(require_inband_signal)

This will enable frame-accurate go-live on the LiveVideo object and the API will respond with a new secure stream URL which you can then stream to. You can disregard the initial secure stream url that was sent to you when you first created the LiveVideo object.

The broadcast will go live and be visible to the audience after (1) the broadcast status is set to LIVE (through a Graph API call or a user publishing from Live Producer) and (2) the encoder sends the go-live RTMP message.

Go-Live RTMP Message Structure

An AMF0 packet (type 0x12) containing:

• the string onGoLive
• an ECMA array (type 0x08) containing a single key-value pair:
  • Key: string (type 0x02) timestamp
  • Value: number (type 0x00): the timestamp of the first video frame that will be publicly visible

For more information, see the RTMP and AMF0 specifications.

Sample Request

Sample request to enable frame-accurate go-live on a LiveVideo.

curl -i -X GET \
   "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/LIVE_VIDEO_ID?fields=secure_stream_url.inband_go_live(require_inband_signal)&access_token=12345..."

Sample Response

Secure stream URL for a LiveVideo object with frame-accurate go-live enabled.

{
  "secure_stream_url": "rtmps://rtmp-pc.facebook.com:443/rtmp/LIVE_VIDEO_ID?s_bl=1&s_gl=1&...",
  "id": "LIVE_VIDEO_ID"
}

Get Error Code Data

To get error code data associated with a broadcast, send a request to:

GET /<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?fields=errors

The API will respond with the error code, type, message, and a timestamp.

Sample Response

curl -i -X GET \
 "https://graph.facebook.com/v21.0/<LIVE_VIDEO_ID>?fields=errors"

Sample Response

{
  "errors": {
    "data": [
      {
        "error_code": 1969004,
        "error_type": "stream",
        "error_message": "Video signal lost",
        "creation_time": "2018-12-05T23:58:52+0000"
      },
      {
        "error_code": 1969004,
        "error_type": "stream",
        "error_message": "Video signal lost",
        "creation_time": "2018-12-05T23:58:52+0000"
      },
      {
        "error_code": 0,
        "error_type": "info",
        "error_message": "Live Service received the video signal",
        "creation_time": "2018-12-05T23:58:02+0000"
      },
      {
        "error_code": 0,
        "error_type": "info",
        "error_message": "Live Service received the video signal",
        "creation_time": "2018-12-05T23:58:02+0000"
      }
    ]
  },
  "id": "{your-live-video-id}"
}

Common Live Video API error codes

Permission error codes

See Also

• Access Tokens
• LiveVideo Reference
• Page Reference
• PageLiveVideos Reference
• Permission Reference
• User Reference
• UserLiveVideos Reference