How to Change Facebook Live Settings

Going live on Facebook is more than just pointing your camera and hitting a button, it's about controlling the entire viewer experience from start to finish. Mastering your Facebook Live settings is the secret to producing a broadcast that looks professional, reaches the right audience, and drives real engagement. This guide will walk you through exactly where to find and how to change every important setting - before, during, and after your broadcast - so you can stream with confidence.

Understanding the Facebook Live Producer: Your Command Center

Forget trying to manage a serious live stream from your phone. For complete control, you need to use the desktop version called the Facebook Live Producer. This is your mission control for every broadcast, giving you access to all the granular settings that separate an amateur stream from a polished one. You can get there by going to the page, group, or profile you want to stream from and clicking the "Live video" button found in the post-creation box.

When you open it, you’ll see two main options to start: "Go live now" or "Create live video event." Going live now is for spontaneous streams, while creating an event allows you to schedule it in advance and notify your audience. Whichever you choose, you'll land in the main producer dashboard, which looks intimidating at first glance but is pretty straightforward. It's essentially broken down into a left-hand navigation pane (for Settings, Interactivity, etc.) and a right-hand preview window.

Before You Go Live: Pre-Broadcast Settings to Nail

The majority of your work happens before you ever push the "Go live" button. Getting these settings right is fundamental to a successful broadcast. Let's cover the essentials.

Choosing Your Post Details and Audience

On the left side of the Live Producer, you'll see a section to add details. This is your first and most important step.

• Title and Description: Don't skip this! Your title is what grabs attention in the feed, and the description is your chance to provide context. Use keywords your audience might search for, include links to your website or products, and tell people what the stream is about. Think of it as free advertising for your broadcast. An engaging title like "Live Q&A: Unpacking the Latest Social Media Trends" is far better than "Live Video."
• Privacy & Posting Destination: Right below the description, you decide where your video will live and who gets to see it. You can post to your profile, a Page you manage, or a Group you belong to. Then choose your privacy:
  • Public: Anyone on or off Facebook can see it. Use this for brand awareness, product launches, and general marketing.
  • Friends: Only your friends can see it. Great for personal updates.
  • Groups: If you're posting in a group, this is the default. Excellent for creating content for a niche community.
  • Only me: This is your secret weapon. Use this setting to do a full test run of your broadcast. You can go live, test your audio, check your lighting, and practice your talking points without anyone watching. It's the perfect way to build confidence before a public stream.

Stream Setup: Camera, Mic, and Software

This is where you handle the technical side of your broadcast. Facebook gives you two main ways to source your video feed.

1. Using Your Webcam

This is the simplest option. Select "Webcam," and Facebook will ask for permission to use your computer’s built-in camera and microphone. In the "Setup" section, you’ll see dropdown menus for "Camera" and "Microphone." If you have an external USB webcam or microphone plugged in (which we highly recommend for better quality), you can select it from this list. You can also turn on Screen Sharing here, which is perfect for tutorials, presentations, or software demos.

2. Using Streaming Software

For a professional-grade broadcast with custom graphics, multiple camera angles, or guests, you’ll need to use "Streaming software." This option works with third-party tools like OBS Studio (which is free), StreamYard, or Ecamm Live. When you select this, Facebook provides a Stream Key. This key is a unique string of characters you copy and paste into your streaming software to connect it to your Facebook broadcast.

• Persistent Stream Key: You can choose to use a persistent key, which means it won't change every time you go live. This saves you the step of having to copy and paste it for every broadcast. Just be sure to keep it private!

In-Stream Settings: Managing Your Broadcast in Real-Time

Once you’re live, your job shifts from setup to moderation and engagement. The Live Producer gives you some incredible tools to interact with your audience right from a single dashboard.

Interactivity Tools to Boost Engagement

Engaging with your audience in real-time is what makes live video so powerful. Look for the "Interactivity" tab in your dashboard.

• Polls: You can create polls before you go live and then publish them at the perfect moment during the stream. It's a fantastic way to break the ice or gather feedback. For example, you could ask, "What topic do you want to see next?" or "Which of these two designs do you prefer?"
• Questions: Use the Questions feature to have viewers submit questions specifically for a Q&A segment. Better yet, you can choose a question and have it display as a graphic overlay on your stream, so everyone knows what you're answering.
• Comments: The comments feed scrolls by on the right side of your dashboard. From here, you can pin an important comment to the top of the feed or highlight a key comment to display it on screen. If you have a moderator helping, they can use this feed to remove spam or answer questions in the chat while you focus on hosting.

Enhancing Your Visuals with Graphics

Under the "Interactivity" tab, you'll also find the "Graphics" section. This allows you to add a layer of professionalism to your stream without needing expensive software.

• Tickers: A ticker is a scrolling line of text at the bottom of the screen, just like on a news channel. You can use this to remind viewers of your website URL, promote a special offer, or share important information.
• Lower Thirds: These are the text boxes that appear at the bottom of the screen to identify who's talking. You can create these directly in the Live Producer to display your name and title, your guest's name, or a key topic phrase. It makes your broadcast feel much more like a structured show.

Advanced Settings for Maximum Impact

Ready to level up? These distribution and streaming settings can significantly increase your reach and improve the viewing experience.

Cross-posting to Other Pages

This is one of the most underutilized growth-hacking features in Facebook Live. Cross-posting allows your live video to be simulcast as an original post on another Facebook Page. It’s not just a share, it’s a native post. For this to work, the other Page must have pre-approved yours for cross-posting (this is handled in Page Settings > Video). Once the relationship is established, go to the "Distribution" section in the Live Producer before you go live and select the pages you want to cross-post to. This multiplies your reach by tapping into another page's audience instantly.

Distribution and Audience Settings

Still within the 'Distribution' tab, you can fine-tune who sees your cast. This isn't about privacy ("public vs. friends") but about geographic or demographic targeting of your public broadcast. Click on "Audience Settings" and you can:

• Restrict by Location: Show your stream only to people in certain countries, or exclude people from certain countries. This is vital for broadcasting content with geographic licensing restrictions, like a live sports event.
• Restrict by Age: Set a minimum or maximum age for your viewers.

You can also choose to disable comments or prohibit embedding on third-party sites from the main 'Settings' tab if you need tighter control over your content.

Understanding Stream Latency

Under Settings > Stream, you'll find an option for Latency. It affects the delay between when you perform an action and when your viewers see it. Here's a quick breakdown:

• Normal Latency: Highest video quality, but has an 8-15 second delay. Great for broadcasts where top-notch production is more important than instant interaction.
• Low Latency: Good video quality with a 3-5 second delay. This is the sweet spot - a good balance of quality stream and real-time interaction.
• Ultra-Low Latency: The quickest option, often under 2 seconds. Pick this option when immediate reactions are critical, like for a live Q&A session. Facebook defaults to this for Webcam broadcasts.

Post-Broadcast: Settings You Can Change After Ending the Stream

Your work isn’t over once you click "End Live Video." The video replay lives on your page, and optimizing it can bring in views for days or weeks to come. After ending the stream, you'll get a prompt to either trim the video or view the post.

• Trimming Your Video: The replay often includes a few seconds (or minutes!) of you getting ready at the beginning or fumbling to end the stream. Use the trimming tool to cut out this dead air for a clean, professional replay that gets straight to the point.
• Editing the Post: You can always go back and edit the video post. Click the three dots on the published video post and select "Edit video." From there, you can change the title, refine the description (add links you forgot!), upload a custom thumbnail, and add video tags to help with discovery. A compelling custom thumbnail is especially huge for getting clicks on the replay.
• Analyzing Performance: Dive into your Insights on your page. Here Facebook shows you performance metrics like peak live viewers, minutes viewed, and audience demographics which will help you improve future broadcasts.

Final Thoughts

Mastering your Facebook Live settings takes your broadcasts from simple streams into polished, high-engagement events. By taking a few extra minutes to configure your audience, enhance your visuals, and leverage distribution tools, you give your content the professional edge it needs to stand out in a crowded feed.

While perfecting your live stream settings is a huge step, it's just one piece of your overall content strategy. To make an impact, that stream needs to be supported by promotional posts before you go live and related content after the fact. At Postbase, we designed our visual calendar to help you map out your entire content plan in one place. You can use it to schedule your promo posts, drop short-form clips after a stream, and ensure your entire live event is woven seamlessly into your content calendar, making sure nothing slips through the cracks.