bluenviron/mediamtx
MediaMTX is a ready-to-use and zero-dependency real-time media server and media proxy that allows to publish, read, proxy, record and playback video and audio streams. It has been conceived as a “media router” that routes media streams from one end to the other.
Live streams can be published to the server with:
| protocol | variants | video codecs | audio codecs |
|---|---|---|---|
| SRT clients | H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3 | |
| SRT cameras and servers | H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3 | |
| WebRTC clients | WHIP | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264 | Opus, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU) |
| WebRTC servers | WHEP | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264 | Opus, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU) |
| RTSP clients | UDP, TCP, RTSPS | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video, M-JPEG and any RTP-compatible codec | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G726, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM and any RTP-compatible codec |
| RTSP cameras and servers | UDP, UDP-Multicast, TCP, RTSPS | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video, M-JPEG and any RTP-compatible codec | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G726, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM and any RTP-compatible codec |
| RTMP clients | RTMP, RTMPS, Enhanced RTMP | AV1, VP9, H265, H264 | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM |
| RTMP cameras and servers | RTMP, RTMPS, Enhanced RTMP | AV1, VP9, H265, H264 | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM |
| HLS cameras and servers | Low-Latency HLS, MP4-based HLS, legacy HLS | AV1, VP9, H265, H264 | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC) |
| UDP/MPEG-TS | Unicast, broadcast, multicast | H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3 |
| Raspberry Pi Cameras | H264 |
Live streams can be read from the server with:
| protocol | variants | video codecs | audio codecs |
|---|---|---|---|
| SRT | H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3 | |
| WebRTC | WHEP | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264 | Opus, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU) |
| RTSP | UDP, UDP-Multicast, TCP, RTSPS | AV1, VP9, VP8, H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video, M-JPEG and any RTP-compatible codec | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G726, G722, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM and any RTP-compatible codec |
| RTMP | RTMP, RTMPS, Enhanced RTMP | H264 | MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3) |
| HLS | Low-Latency HLS, MP4-based HLS, legacy HLS | AV1, VP9, H265, H264 | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC) |
Live streams be recorded and played back with:
| format | video codecs | audio codecs |
|---|---|---|
| fMP4 | AV1, VP9, H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video, M-JPEG | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3, G711 (PCMA, PCMU), LPCM |
| MPEG-TS | H265, H264, MPEG-4 Video (H263, Xvid), MPEG-1/2 Video | Opus, MPEG-4 Audio (AAC), MPEG-1/2 Audio (MP3), AC-3 |
Features
- Publish live streams to the server
- Read live streams from the server
- Streams are automatically converted from a protocol to another
- Serve multiple streams at once in separate paths
- Record streams to disk
- Playback recorded streams
- Authenticate users
- Redirect readers to other RTSP servers (load balancing)
- Control the server through the Control API
- Reload the configuration without disconnecting existing clients (hot reloading)
- Read Prometheus-compatible metrics
- Run hooks (external commands) when clients connect, disconnect, read or publish streams
- Compatible with Linux, Windows and macOS, does not require any dependency or interpreter, it’s a single executable
Note about rtsp-simple-server
rtsp-simple-server has been rebranded as MediaMTX. The reason is pretty obvious: this project started as a RTSP server but has evolved into a much more versatile product that is not tied to the RTSP protocol anymore. Nothing will change regarding license, features and backward compatibility.
Table of contents
- Installation
- Basic usage
- Publish to the server
- Read from the server
- Other features
- Configuration
- Authentication
- Encrypt the configuration
- Remuxing, re-encoding, compression
- Record streams to disk
- Playback recorded streams
- Forward streams to other servers
- Proxy requests to other servers
- On-demand publishing
- Route absolute timestamps
- Expose the server in a subfolder
- Start on boot
- Hooks
- Control API
- Metrics
- pprof
- SRT-specific features
- WebRTC-specific features
- HLS-specific features
- RTSP-specific features
- RTMP-specific features
- Compile from source
- License
- Specifications
- Related projects
Installation
There are several installation methods available: standalone binary, Docker image, Arch Linux package and OpenWrt binary.
Standalone binary
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Download and extract a standalone binary from the release page that corresponds to your operating system and architecture.
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Start the server:
1./mediamtx
Docker image
Download and launch the image:
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Available images:
| name | FFmpeg included | RPI Camera support |
|---|---|---|
| bluenviron/mediamtx:latest | :x: | :x: |
| bluenviron/mediamtx:latest-ffmpeg | :heavy_check_mark: | :x: |
| bluenviron/mediamtx:latest-rpi | :x: | :heavy_check_mark: |
| bluenviron/mediamtx:latest-ffmpeg-rpi | :heavy_check_mark: | :heavy_check_mark: |
The --network=host flag is mandatory for RTSP to work, since Docker can change the source port of UDP packets for routing reasons, and this doesn’t allow the server to identify the senders of the packets.
If the --network=host cannot be used (for instance, it is not compatible with Windows or Kubernetes), you can disable the RTSP UDP transport protocol, add the server IP to MTX_WEBRTCADDITIONALHOSTS and expose ports manually:
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Arch Linux package
If you are running the Arch Linux distribution, run:
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OpenWrt binary
If the architecture of the OpenWrt device is amd64, armv6, armv7 or arm64, use the standalone binary method and download a Linux binary that corresponds to your architecture.
Otherwise, compile the server from source.
Basic usage
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Publish a stream. For instance, you can publish a video/audio file with FFmpeg:
1ffmpeg -re -stream_loop -1 -i file.ts -c copy -f rtsp rtsp://localhost:8554/mystreamor GStreamer:
1 2gst-launch-1.0 rtspclientsink name=s location=rtsp://localhost:8554/mystream filesrc location=file.mp4 \ ! qtdemux name=d d.video_0 ! queue ! s.sink_0 d.audio_0 ! queue ! s.sink_1 -
Open the stream. For instance, you can open the stream with VLC:
1vlc --network-caching=50 rtsp://localhost:8554/mystreamor GStreamer:
1gst-play-1.0 rtsp://localhost:8554/mystreamor FFmpeg:
1ffmpeg -i rtsp://localhost:8554/mystream -c copy output.mp4
Publish to the server
By software
FFmpeg
FFmpeg can publish a stream to the server in multiple ways (SRT client, SRT server, RTSP client, RTMP client, UDP/MPEG-TS, WebRTC with WHIP). The recommended one consists in publishing as a RTSP client:
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The RTSP protocol supports multiple underlying transport protocols, each with its own characteristics (see RTSP-specific features). You can set the transport protocol by using the rtsp_transport flag, for instance, in order to use TCP:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
GStreamer
GStreamer can publish a stream to the server in multiple ways (SRT client, SRT server, RTSP client, RTMP client, UDP/MPEG-TS, WebRTC with WHIP). The recommended one consists in publishing as a RTSP client:
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If the stream is video only:
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The RTSP protocol supports multiple underlying transport protocols, each with its own characteristics (see RTSP-specific features). You can set the transport protocol by using the protocols flag:
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If encryption is enabled, the tls-validation-flags and profiles options must be specified too:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
GStreamer can also publish a stream by using the WebRTC / WHIP protocol. Make sure that GStreamer version is at least 1.22, and that if the codec is H264, the profile is baseline. Use the whipclientsink element:
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OBS Studio
OBS Studio can publish to the server in multiple ways (SRT client, RTMP client, WebRTC client). The recommended one consists in publishing as a RTMP client. In Settings -> Stream (or in the Auto-configuration Wizard), use the following parameters:
- Service:
Custom... - Server:
rtmp://localhost/mystream - Stream key: (empty)
If credentials are in use, use the following parameters:
- Service:
Custom... - Server:
rtmp://localhost/mystream?user=myuser&pass=mypass - Stream key: (empty)
Save the configuration and click Start streaming.
If you want to generate a stream that can be read with WebRTC, open Settings -> Output -> Recording and use the following parameters:
- FFmpeg output type:
Output to URL - File path or URL:
rtsp://localhost:8554/mystream - Container format:
rtsp - Check
show all codecs (even if potentically incompatible) - Video encoder:
h264_nvenc (libx264) - Video encoder settings (if any):
bf=0 - Audio track:
1 - Audio encoder:
libopus
Then use the button Start Recording (instead of Start Streaming) to start streaming.
Recent versions of OBS Studio can also publish to the server with the WebRTC / WHIP protocol. Use the following parameters:
- Service:
WHIP - Server:
http://localhost:8889/mystream/whip - Bearer Token:
myuser:mypass(when internal authentication is enabled) orJWT(when JWT-based authentication is enabled)
Save the configuration and click Start streaming.
The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
OpenCV
Software which uses the OpenCV library can publish to the server through its GStreamer plugin, as a RTSP client. It must be compiled with GStreamer support, by following this procedure:
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You can check that OpenCV has been installed correctly by running:
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Check that the output contains GStreamer: YES.
Videos can be published with cv2.VideoWriter:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
Unity
Software written with the Unity Engine can publish a stream to the server by using the WebRTC protocol.
Create a new Unity project or open an existing open.
Open Window -> Package Manager, click on the plus sign, Add Package by name… and insert com.unity.webrtc. Wait for the package to be installed.
In the Project window, under Assets, create a new C# Script called WebRTCPublisher.cs with this content:
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In the Hierarchy window, find or create a scene and a camera, then add the WebRTCPublisher.cs script as component of the camera, by dragging it inside the Inspector window. then Press the Play button at the top of the page.
The resulting stream is available in path /unity.
Web browsers
Web browsers can publish a stream to the server by using the WebRTC protocol. Start the server and open the web page:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
This web page can be embedded into another web page by using an iframe:
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For more advanced setups, you can create and serve a custom web page by starting from the source code of the WebRTC publish page. In particular, there’s a ready-to-use, standalone JavaScript class for publishing streams with WebRTC, available in publisher.js.
By device
Generic webcam
If the operating system is Linux-based, edit mediamtx.yml and replace everything inside section paths with the following content:
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If the operating system is Windows:
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Where USB2.0 HD UVC WebCam is the name of a webcam, that can be obtained with:
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The resulting stream is available in path /cam.
Raspberry Pi Cameras
MediaMTX natively supports most of the Raspberry Pi Camera models, enabling high-quality and low-latency video streaming from the camera to any user, for any purpose. There are a couple of requirements:
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The server must run on a Raspberry Pi, with one of the following operating systems:
- Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm
- Raspberry Pi OS Bullseye
Both 32 bit and 64 bit architectures are supported.
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If you are using Raspberry Pi OS Bullseye, make sure that the legacy camera stack is disabled. Type
sudo raspi-config, then go toInterfacing options,enable/disable legacy camera support, chooseno. Reboot the system.
If you want to run the standard (non-Docker) version of the server:
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Download the server executable. If you’re using 64-bit version of the operative system, make sure to pick the
arm64variant. -
Edit
mediamtx.ymland replace everything inside sectionpathswith the following content:1 2 3paths: cam: source: rpiCamera
The resulting stream is available in path /cam.
If you want to run the server inside Docker, you need to use the latest-rpi image and launch the container with some additional flags:
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Be aware that precompiled binaries and Docker images are not compatible with cameras that require a custom libcamera (like some ArduCam products), since they come with a bundled libcamera. If you want to use a custom one, you can compile from source.
Camera settings can be changed by using the rpiCamera* parameters:
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All available parameters are listed in the sample configuration file.
Adding audio
In order to add audio from a USB microfone, install GStreamer and alsa-utils:
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list available audio cards with:
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Sample output:
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Find the audio card of the microfone and take note of its name, for instance default:CARD=U0x46d0x809. Then create a new path that takes the video stream from the camera and audio from the microphone:
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The resulting stream is available in path /cam_with_audio.
Secondary stream
It is possible to enable a secondary stream from the same camera, with a different resolution, FPS and codec. Configuration is the same of a primary stream, with rpiCameraSecondary set to true and parameters adjusted accordingly:
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The secondary stream is available in path /secondary.
By protocol
SRT clients
SRT is a protocol that allows to publish and read live data stream, providing encryption, integrity and a retransmission mechanism. It is usually used to transfer media streams encoded with MPEG-TS. In order to publish a stream to the server with the SRT protocol, use this URL:
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Replace mystream with any name you want. The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
If credentials are enabled, append username and password to streamid:
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If you need to use the standard stream ID syntax instead of the custom one in use by this server, see Standard stream ID syntax.
If you want to publish a stream by using a client in listening mode (i.e. with mode=listener appended to the URL), read the next section.
Known clients that can publish with SRT are FFmpeg, GStreamer, OBS Studio.
SRT cameras and servers
In order to ingest into the server a SRT stream from an existing server, camera or client in listening mode (i.e. with mode=listener appended to the URL), add the corresponding URL into the source parameter of a path:
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WebRTC clients
WebRTC is an API that makes use of a set of protocols and methods to connect two clients together and allow them to exchange real-time media or data streams. You can publish a stream with WebRTC and a web browser by visiting:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
WHIP is a WebRTC extensions that allows to publish streams by using a URL, without passing through a web page. This allows to use WebRTC as a general purpose streaming protocol. If you are using a software that supports WHIP (for instance, latest versions of OBS Studio), you can publish a stream to the server by using this URL:
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Regarding authentication, read Authenticating with WHIP/WHEP.
Depending on the network it may be difficult to establish a connection between server and clients, read Solving WebRTC connectivity issues.
Known clients that can publish with WebRTC and WHIP are FFmpeg, GStreamer, OBS Studio, Unity and Web browsers.
WebRTC servers
In order to ingest into the server a WebRTC stream from an existing server, add the corresponding WHEP URL into the source parameter of a path:
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RTSP clients
RTSP is a protocol that allows to publish and read streams. It supports different underlying transport protocols and allows to encrypt streams in transit (see RTSP-specific features). In order to publish a stream to the server with the RTSP protocol, use this URL:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
Known clients that can publish with RTSP are FFmpeg, GStreamer, OBS Studio.
RTSP cameras and servers
Most IP cameras expose their video stream by using a RTSP server that is embedded into the camera itself. In particular, cameras that are compliant with ONVIF profile S or T meet this requirement. You can use MediaMTX to connect to one or multiple existing RTSP servers and read their video streams:
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The resulting stream is available in path /proxied.
The server supports any number of source streams (count is just limited by available hardware resources) it’s enough to add additional entries to the paths section:
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RTMP clients
RTMP is a protocol that allows to read and publish streams, but is less versatile and less efficient than RTSP and WebRTC (doesn’t support UDP, doesn’t support most RTSP codecs, doesn’t support feedback mechanism). Streams can be published to the server by using the URL:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mystream.
In case authentication is enabled, credentials can be passed to the server by using the user and pass query parameters:
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Known clients that can publish with RTMP are FFmpeg, GStreamer, OBS Studio.
RTMP cameras and servers
You can use MediaMTX to connect to one or multiple existing RTMP servers and read their video streams:
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The resulting stream is available in path /proxied.
HLS cameras and servers
HLS is a streaming protocol that works by splitting streams into segments, and by serving these segments and a playlist with the HTTP protocol. You can use MediaMTX to connect to one or multiple existing HLS servers and read their video streams:
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The resulting stream is available in path /proxied.
UDP/MPEG-TS
The server supports ingesting UDP/MPEG-TS packets (i.e. MPEG-TS packets sent with UDP). Packets can be unicast, broadcast or multicast. For instance, you can generate a multicast UDP/MPEG-TS stream with GStreamer:
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or FFmpeg:
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Edit mediamtx.yml and replace everything inside section paths with the following content:
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The resulting stream is available in path /mypath.
If the listening IP is a multicast IP, MediaMTX listens for incoming multicast packets on all network interfaces. It is possible to listen on a single interface only by using the interface parameter:
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It is possible to restrict who can send packets by using the source parameter:
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Known clients that can publish with UDP/MPEG-TS are FFmpeg and GStreamer.
Read from the server
By software
FFmpeg
FFmpeg can read a stream from the server in multiple ways (RTSP, RTMP, HLS, WebRTC with WHEP, SRT). The recommended one consists in reading with RTSP:
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The RTSP protocol supports multiple underlying transport protocols, each with its own characteristics (see RTSP-specific features). You can set the transport protocol by using the rtsp_transport flag:
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GStreamer
GStreamer can read a stream from the server in multiple ways (RTSP, RTMP, HLS, WebRTC with WHEP, SRT). The recommended one consists in reading with RTSP:
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The RTSP protocol supports multiple underlying transport protocols, each with its own characteristics (see RTSP-specific features). You can change the transport protocol by using the protocols flag:
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If encryption is enabled, set tls-validation-flags to 0:
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GStreamer also supports reading streams with WebRTC/WHEP, although track codecs must be specified in advance through the video-caps and audio-caps parameters. Furthermore, if audio is not present, audio-caps must be set anyway and must point to a PCMU codec. For instance, the command for reading a video-only H264 stream is:
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While the command for reading an audio-only Opus stream is:
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While the command for reading a H264 and Opus stream is:
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VLC
VLC can read a stream from the server in multiple ways (RTSP, RTMP, HLS, SRT). The recommended one consists in reading with RTSP:
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The RTSP protocol supports multiple underlying transport protocols, each with its own characteristics (see RTSP-specific features).
In order to use the TCP transport protocol, use the --rtsp_tcp flag:
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In order to use the UDP-multicast transport protocol, append ?vlcmulticast to the URL:
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Ubuntu bug
The VLC shipped with Ubuntu 21.10 doesn’t support playing RTSP due to a license issue (see here and here). To fix the issue, remove the default VLC instance and install the snap version:
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Encrypted streams
At the moment VLC doesn’t support reading encrypted RTSP streams. However, you can use a proxy like stunnel or nginx or a local MediaMTX instance to decrypt streams before reading them.
Unity
Software written with the Unity Engine can read a stream from the server by using the WebRTC protocol.
Create a new Unity project or open an existing open.
Open Window -> Package Manager, click on the plus sign, Add Package by name… and insert com.unity.webrtc. Wait for the package to be installed.
In the Project window, under Assets, create a new C# Script called WebRTCReader.cs with this content:
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Edit the url variable according to your needs.
In the Hierarchy window, find or create a scene. Inside the scene, add a Canvas. Inside the Canvas, add a Raw Image and an Audio Source. Then add the WebRTCReader.cs script as component of the canvas, by dragging it inside the Inspector window. then Press the Play button at the top of the page.
Web browsers
Web browsers can read a stream from the server in multiple ways (WebRTC or HLS).
You can read a stream by using the WebRTC protocol by visiting the web page:
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This web page can be embedded into another web page by using an iframe:
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For more advanced setups, you can create and serve a custom web page by starting from the source code of the WebRTC read page. In particular, there’s a ready-to-use, standalone JavaScript class for reading streams with WebRTC, available in reader.js.
Web browsers can also read a stream with the HLS protocol. Latency is higher but there are less problems related to connectivity between server and clients, furthermore the server load can be balanced by using a common HTTP CDN (like CloudFront or Cloudflare), and this allows to handle readers in the order of millions. Visit the web page:
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This web page can be embedded into another web page by using an iframe:
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For more advanced setups, you can create and serve a custom web page by starting from the source code of the HLS read page.
By protocol
SRT
SRT is a protocol that allows to publish and read live data stream, providing encryption, integrity and a retransmission mechanism. It is usually used to transfer media streams encoded with MPEG-TS. In order to read a stream from the server with the SRT protocol, use this URL:
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Replace mystream with the path name.
If credentials are enabled, append username and password to streamid:
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If you need to use the standard stream ID syntax instead of the custom one in use by this server, see Standard stream ID syntax.
Known clients that can read with SRT are FFmpeg, GStreamer and VLC.
WebRTC
WebRTC is an API that makes use of a set of protocols and methods to connect two clients together and allow them to exchange real-time media or data streams. You can read a stream with WebRTC and a web browser by visiting:
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WHEP is a WebRTC extensions that allows to read streams by using a URL, without passing through a web page. This allows to use WebRTC as a general purpose streaming protocol. If you are using a software that supports WHEP, you can read a stream from the server by using this URL:
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Regarding authentication, read Authenticating with WHIP/WHEP.
Depending on the network it may be difficult to establish a connection between server and clients, read Solving WebRTC connectivity issues.
Known clients that can read with WebRTC and WHEP are FFmpeg, GStreamer, Unity and web browsers.
RTSP
RTSP is a protocol that allows to publish and read streams. It supports different underlying transport protocols and allows to encrypt streams in transit (see RTSP-specific features). In order to read a stream with the RTSP protocol, use this URL:
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Known clients that can read with RTSP are FFmpeg, GStreamer and VLC.
Latency
The RTSP protocol doesn’t introduce any latency by itself. Latency is usually introduced by clients, that put frames in a buffer to compensate network fluctuations. In order to decrease latency, the best way consists in tuning the client. For instance, in VLC, latency can be decreased by decreasing the Network caching parameter, that is available in the Open network stream dialog or alternatively can be set with the command line:
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RTMP
RTMP is a protocol that allows to read and publish streams, but is less versatile and less efficient than RTSP and WebRTC (doesn’t support UDP, doesn’t support most RTSP codecs, doesn’t support feedback mechanism). Streams can be read from the server by using the URL:
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In case authentication is enabled, credentials can be passed to the server by using the user and pass query parameters:
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Known clients that can read with RTMP are FFmpeg, GStreamer and VLC.
HLS
HLS is a protocol that works by splitting streams into segments, and by serving these segments and a playlist with the HTTP protocol. You can use MediaMTX to generate a HLS stream, that is accessible through a web page:
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and can also be accessed without using the browsers, by software that supports the HLS protocol (for instance VLC or MediaMTX itself) by using this URL:
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Known clients that can read with HLS are FFmpeg, GStreamer, VLC and web browsers.
LL-HLS
Low-Latency HLS is a recently standardized variant of the protocol that allows to greatly reduce playback latency. It works by splitting segments into parts, that are served before the segment is complete. LL-HLS is enabled by default. If the stream is not shown correctly, try tuning the hlsPartDuration parameter, for instance:
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Compatibility with Apple devices
In order to correctly display Low-Latency HLS streams in Safari running on Apple devices (iOS or macOS), a TLS certificate is needed and can be generated with OpenSSL:
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Set the hlsEncryption, hlsServerKey and hlsServerCert parameters in the configuration file:
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Keep also in mind that not all H264 video streams can be played on Apple Devices due to some intrinsic properties (distance between I-Frames, profile). If the video can’t be played correctly, you can either:
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re-encode it by following instructions in this README
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disable the Low-latency variant of HLS and go back to the legacy variant:
1hlsVariant: mpegts
Latency
in HLS, latency is introduced since a client must wait for the server to generate segments before downloading them. This latency amounts to 500ms-3s when the low-latency HLS variant is enabled (and it is by default), otherwise amounts to 1-15secs.
To decrease the latency, you can:
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try decreasing the hlsPartDuration parameter
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try decreasing the hlsSegmentDuration parameter
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The segment duration is influenced by the interval between the IDR frames of the video track. An IDR frame is a frame that can be decoded independently from the others. The server changes the segment duration in order to include at least one IDR frame into each segment. Therefore, you need to decrease the interval between the IDR frames. This can be done in two ways:
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if the stream is being hardware-generated (i.e. by a camera), there’s usually a setting called Key-Frame Interval in the camera configuration page
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otherwise, the stream must be re-encoded. It’s possible to tune the IDR frame interval by using ffmpeg’s -g option:
1ffmpeg -i rtsp://original-stream -c:v libx264 -pix_fmt yuv420p -preset ultrafast -b:v 600k -max_muxing_queue_size 1024 -g 30 -f rtsp rtsp://localhost:$RTSP_PORT/compressed
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Other features
Configuration
All the configuration parameters are listed and commented in the configuration file.
There are 3 ways to change the configuration:
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By editing the
mediamtx.ymlfile, that is-
included into the release bundle
-
available in the root folder of the Docker image (
/mediamtx.yml); it can be overridden in this way:1docker run --rm -it --network=host -v "$PWD/mediamtx.yml:/mediamtx.yml:ro" bluenviron/mediamtx
The configuration can be changed dynamically when the server is running (hot reloading) by writing to the configuration file. Changes are detected and applied without disconnecting existing clients, whenever it’s possible.
-
-
By overriding configuration parameters with environment variables, in the format
MTX_PARAMNAME, wherePARAMNAMEis the uppercase name of a parameter. For instance, thertspAddressparameter can be overridden in the following way:1MTX_RTSPADDRESS="127.0.0.1:8554" ./mediamtxParameters that have array as value can be overridden by setting a comma-separated list. For example:
1MTX_RTSPTRANSPORTS="tcp,udp"Parameters in maps can be overridden by using underscores, in the following way:
1MTX_PATHS_TEST_SOURCE=rtsp://myurl ./mediamtxThis method is particularly useful when using Docker; any configuration parameter can be changed by passing environment variables with the
-eflag:1docker run --rm -it --network=host -e MTX_PATHS_TEST_SOURCE=rtsp://myurl bluenviron/mediamtx -
By using the Control API.
Authentication
Internal
The server provides three methods to authenticate users:
- Internal: users are stored in the configuration file
- HTTP-based: an external HTTP URL is contacted to perform authentication
- JWT: an external identity server provides authentication through JWTs
The internal authentication method is the default one. Users are stored inside the configuration file, in this format:
|
|
Only clients that provide username and passwords will be able to perform a certain action:
|
|
If storing plain credentials in the configuration file is a security problem, username and passwords can be stored as hashed strings. The Argon2 and SHA256 hashing algorithms are supported. To use Argon2, the string must be hashed using Argon2id (recommended) or Argon2i:
|
|
Then stored with the argon2: prefix:
|
|
To use SHA256, the string must be hashed with SHA256 and encoded with base64:
|
|
Then stored with the sha256: prefix:
|
|
WARNING: enable encryption or use a VPN to ensure that no one is intercepting the credentials in transit.
HTTP-based
Authentication can be delegated to an external HTTP server:
|
|
Each time a user needs to be authenticated, the specified URL will be requested with the POST method and this payload:
|
|
If the URL returns a status code that begins with 20 (i.e. 200), authentication is successful, otherwise it fails. Be aware that it’s perfectly normal for the authentication server to receive requests with empty users and passwords, i.e.:
|
|
This happens because RTSP clients don’t provide credentials until they are asked to. In order to receive the credentials, the authentication server must reply with status code 401, then the client will send credentials.
Some actions can be excluded from the process:
|
|
JWT-based
Authentication can be delegated to an external identity server, that is capable of generating JWTs and provides a JWKS endpoint. With respect to the HTTP-based method, this has the advantage that the external server is contacted once, and not for every request, greatly improving performance. In order to use the JWT-based authentication method, set authMethod and authJWTJWKS:
|
|
The JWT is expected to contain a claim, with a list of permissions in the same format as the one of user permissions:
|
|
Clients are expected to pass the JWT in one of the following ways (from best to worst):
-
Through the
Authorization: BearerHTTP header. This is possible if the protocol or feature is based on HTTP, like HLS, WebRTC, API, Metrics, pprof. -
As password. Username is arbitrary.
-
As query parameter in the URL, with the
jwtkey. This method is discouraged since the JWT is publicly shared when the URL is shared, causing a security issue.
These are the recommended methods for each client:
| client | protocol | method | notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Web browsers | HLS | Authorization: Bearer | |
| Web browsers | WebRTC | Authorization: Bearer | |
| OBS Studio | WebRTC | Authorization: Bearer | |
| OBS Studio | RTMP | Query parameter | |
| FFmpeg | RTSP | Query parameter | password is truncated and cannot be used |
| FFmpeg | RTMP | unsupported | Passwords and query parameters are currently truncated to 1024 characters by FFmpeg, so it’s impossible to use FFMPEG+RTMP+JWT |
| GStreamer | RTSP | Password | |
| GStreamer | RTMP | Query parameter | |
| any | SRT | unsupported | SRT truncates passwords and query parameters to 512 characters, so it’s impossible to use SRT+JWT. See #3430 |
Here’s a tutorial on how to setup the Keycloak identity server in order to provide JWTs:
-
Start Keycloak:
1docker run --name=keycloak -p 8080:8080 -e KEYCLOAK_ADMIN=admin -e KEYCLOAK_ADMIN_PASSWORD=admin quay.io/keycloak/keycloak:23.0.7 start-dev -
Open the Keycloak administration console on http://localhost:8080, click on master in the top left corner, create realm, set realm name to
mediamtx, Save -
Open page Client scopes, create client scope, set name to
mediamtx, Save -
Open tab Mappers, Configure a new Mapper, User Attribute
- Name:
mediamtx_permissions - User Attribute:
mediamtx_permissions - Token Claim Name:
mediamtx_permissions - Claim JSON Type:
JSON - Multivalued:
On
Save
- Name:
-
Open page Clients, Create client, set Client ID to
mediamtx, Next, Client authenticationOn, Next, Save -
Open tab Credentials, copy client secret somewhere
-
Open tab Client scopes, Add client scope, Select
mediamtx, Add, Default -
Open page Users, Add user, Username
testuser, Tab credentials, Set password, pick a password, Save -
Open tab Attributes, Add an attribute
- Key:
mediamtx_permissions - Value:
{"action":"publish", "path": ""}
You can add as many attributes with key
mediamtx_permissionsas you want, each with a single permission in it - Key:
-
In MediaMTX, use the following URL:
1authJWTJWKS: http://localhost:8080/realms/mediamtx/protocol/openid-connect/certs -
Perform authentication on Keycloak:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7curl \ -d "client_id=mediamtx" \ -d "client_secret=$CLIENT_SECRET" \ -d "username=$USER" \ -d "password=$PASS" \ -d "grant_type=password" \ http://localhost:8080/realms/mediamtx/protocol/openid-connect/tokenThe JWT is inside the
access_tokenkey of the response:1{"access_token":"eyJhbGciOiJSUzI1NiIsInR5cCIgOiAiSldUIiwia2lkIiA6ICIyNzVjX3ptOVlOdHQ0TkhwWVk4Und6ZndUclVGSzRBRmQwY3lsM2wtY3pzIn0.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.Gevz7rf1qHqFg7cqtSfSP31v_NS0VH7MYfwAdra1t6Yt5rTr9vJzqUeGfjYLQWR3fr4XC58DrPOhNnILCpo7jWRdimCnbPmuuCJ0AYM-Aoi3PAsWZNxgmtopq24_JokbFArY9Y1wSGFvF8puU64lt1jyOOyxf2M4cBHCs_EarCKOwuQmEZxSf8Z-QV9nlfkoTUszDCQTiKyeIkLRHL2Iy7Fw7_T3UI7sxJjVIt0c6HCNJhBBazGsYzmcSQ_GrmhbUteMTg00o6FicqkMBe99uZFnx9wIBm_QbO9hbAkkzF923I-DTAQrFLxT08ESMepDwmzFrmnwWYBLE3u8zuUlCA","expires_in":300,"refresh_expires_in":1800,"refresh_token":"eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCIgOiAiSldUIiwia2lkIiA6ICI3OTI3Zjg4Zi05YWM4LTRlNmEtYWE1OC1kZmY0MDQzZDRhNGUifQ.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.yuXV8_JU0TQLuosNdp5xlYMjn7eO5Xq-PusdHzE7bsQ","token_type":"Bearer","not-before-policy":0,"session_state":"cc2d48cc-d2e9-44b0-893e-0a7a62bd25bd","scope":"mediamtx profile email"}
Encrypt the configuration
The configuration file can be entirely encrypted for security purposes by using the crypto_secretbox function of the NaCL function. An online tool for performing this operation is available here.
After performing the encryption, put the base64-encoded result into the configuration file, and launch the server with the MTX_CONFKEY variable:
|
|
Remuxing, re-encoding, compression
To change the format, codec or compression of a stream, use FFmpeg or GStreamer together with MediaMTX. For instance, to re-encode an existing stream, that is available in the /original path, and publish the resulting stream in the /compressed path, edit mediamtx.yml and replace everything inside section paths with the following content:
|
|
Record streams to disk
To save available streams to disk, set the record and the recordPath parameter in the configuration file:
|
|
All available recording parameters are listed in the sample configuration file.
Be aware that not all codecs can be saved with all formats, as described in the compatibility matrix at the beginning of the README.
To upload recordings to a remote location, you can use MediaMTX together with rclone, a command line tool that provides file synchronization capabilities with a huge variety of services (including S3, FTP, SMB, Google Drive):
-
Download and install rclone.
-
Configure rclone:
1rclone config -
Place
rcloneinto therunOnInitandrunOnRecordSegmentCompletehooks:1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8pathDefaults: # this is needed to sync segments after a crash. # replace myconfig with the name of the rclone config. runOnInit: rclone sync -v ./recordings myconfig:/my-path/recordings # this is called when a segment has been finalized. # replace myconfig with the name of the rclone config. runOnRecordSegmentComplete: rclone sync -v --min-age=1ms ./recordings myconfig:/my-path/recordingsIf you want to delete local segments after they are uploaded, replace
rclone syncwithrclone move.
Playback recorded streams
Existing recordings can be served to users through a dedicated HTTP server, that can be enabled inside the configuration:
|
|
The server provides an endpoint to list recorded timespans:
|
|
Where:
- [mypath] is the name of a path
- [start] (optional) is the start date in RFC3339 format
- [end] (optional) is the end date in RFC3339 format
The server will return a list of timespans in JSON format:
|
|
The server provides an endpoint to download recordings:
|
|
Where:
- [mypath] is the path name
- [start] is the start date in RFC3339 format
- [duration] is the maximum duration of the recording in seconds
- [format] (optional) is the output format of the stream. Available values are “fmp4” (default) and “mp4”
All parameters must be url-encoded. For instance:
|
|
The resulting stream uses the fMP4 format, that is natively compatible with any browser, therefore its URL can be directly inserted into a <video> tag:
|
|
The fMP4 format may offer limited compatibility with some players. To fix the issue, it’s possible to use the standard MP4 format, by adding format=mp4 to a /get request:
|
|
Forward streams to other servers
To forward incoming streams to another server, use FFmpeg inside the runOnReady parameter:
|
|
Proxy requests to other servers
The server allows to proxy incoming requests to other servers or cameras. This is useful to expose servers or cameras behind a NAT. Edit mediamtx.yml and replace everything inside section paths with the following content:
|
|
All requests addressed to rtsp://server:8854/proxy_a will be forwarded to rtsp://other-server:8854/a and so on.
On-demand publishing
Edit mediamtx.yml and replace everything inside section paths with the following content:
|
|
The command inserted into runOnDemand will start only when a client requests the path ondemand, therefore the file will start streaming only when requested.
Route absolute timestamps
Some streaming protocols allow to route absolute timestamps, associated with each frame, that are useful for synchronizing several video or data streams together. In particular, MediaMTX supports receiving absolute timestamps with the following protocols and devices:
- HLS (through the
EXT-X-PROGRAM-DATE-TIMEtag in playlists) - RTSP (through RTCP reports, when
useAbsoluteTimestampistruein settings) - WebRTC (through RTCP reports, when
useAbsoluteTimestampistruein settings) - Raspberry Pi Camera
and supports sending absolute timestamps with the following protocols:
- HLS (through the
EXT-X-PROGRAM-DATE-TIMEtag in playlists) - RTSP (through RTCP reports)
- WebRTC (through RTCP reports)
A library that can read absolute timestamps with HLS is gohlslib.
A library that can read absolute timestamps with RTSP is gortsplib.
A browser can read read absolute timestamps with WebRTC if it exposes the estimatedPlayoutTimestamp statistic.
Expose the server in a subfolder
HTTP-based services (WebRTC, HLS, Control API, Playback Server, Metrics, pprof) can be exposed in a subfolder of an existing HTTP server or reverse proxy. The reverse proxy must be able to intercept HTTP requests addressed to MediaMTX and corresponding responses, and perform the following changes:
-
The subfolder path must be stripped from request paths. For instance, if the server is exposed behind
/subpathand the reverse proxy receives a request with path/subpath/mystream/index.m3u8, this has to be changed into/mystream/index.m3u8. -
Any
Locationheader in responses must be prefixed with the subfolder path. For instance, if the server is exposed behind/subpathand the server sends a response withLocation: /mystream/index.m3u8, this has to be changed intoLocation: /subfolder/mystream/index.m3u8.
If nginx is the reverse proxy, this can be achieved with the following configuration:
|
|
If Apache HTTP Server is the reverse proxy, this can be achieved with the following configuration:
|
|
If Caddy is the reverse proxy, this can be achieved with the following configuration:
|
|
Start on boot
Linux
On most Linux distributions (including Ubuntu and Debian, but not OpenWrt), systemd is in charge of managing services and starting them on boot.
Move the server executable and configuration in global folders:
|
|
Create a systemd service:
|
|
If SELinux is enabled (for instance in case of RedHat, Rocky, CentOS++), add correct security context:
|
|
Enable and start the service:
|
|
OpenWrt
Move the server executable and configuration in global folders:
|
|
Create a procd service:
|
|
Enable and start the service:
|
|
Read the server logs:
|
|
Windows
Download the WinSW v2 executable and place it into the same folder of mediamtx.exe.
In the same folder, create a file named WinSW-x64.xml with this content:
|
|
Open a terminal, navigate to the folder and run:
|
|
The server is now installed as a system service and will start at boot time.
Hooks
The server allows to specify commands that are executed when a certain event happens, allowing the propagation of events to external software.
runOnConnect allows to run a command when a client connects to the server:
|
|
runOnDisconnect allows to run a command when a client disconnects from the server:
|
|
runOnInit allows to run a command when a path is initialized. This can be used to publish a stream when the server is launched:
|
|
runOnDemand allows to run a command when a path is requested by a reader. This can be used to publish a stream on demand:
|
|
runOnUnDemand allows to run a command when there are no readers anymore:
|
|
runOnReady allows to run a command when a stream is ready to be read:
|
|
runOnNotReady allows to run a command when a stream is not available anymore:
|
|
runOnRead allows to run a command when a client starts reading:
|
|
runOnUnread allows to run a command when a client stops reading:
|
|
runOnRecordSegmentCreate allows to run a command when a recording segment is created:
|
|
runOnRecordSegmentComplete allows to run a command when a recording segment is complete:
|
|
Control API
The server can be queried and controlled with an API, that can be enabled by setting the api parameter in the configuration:
|
|
To obtain a list of of active paths, run:
|
|
Full documentation of the Control API is available on the dedicated site.
Be aware that by default the Control API is accessible by localhost only; to increase visibility or add authentication, check Authentication.
Metrics
A metrics exporter, compatible with Prometheus, can be enabled with the parameter metrics: yes; then the server can be queried for metrics with Prometheus or with a simple HTTP request:
|
|
Obtaining:
|
|
pprof
A performance monitor, compatible with pprof, can be enabled with the parameter pprof: yes; then the server can be queried for metrics with pprof-compatible tools, like:
|
|
SRT-specific features
Standard stream ID syntax
In SRT, the stream ID is a string that is sent to the remote part in order to advertise what action the caller is gonna do (publish or read), the path and the credentials. All these informations have to be encoded into a single string. This server supports two stream ID syntaxes, a custom one (that is the one reported in rest of the README) and also a standard one proposed by the authors of the protocol and enforced by some hardware. The standard syntax can be used in this way:
|
|
Where:
- key
mcontains the action (publishorrequest) - key
rcontains the path - key
ucontains the username - key
scontains the password
WebRTC-specific features
Authenticating with WHIP/WHEP
When using WHIP or WHEP to establish a WebRTC connection, there are several ways to provide credentials.
-
If internal authentication or HTTP-based authentication is in use, username and password can be passed through the
Authorization: BasicHTTP header:1Authorization: Basic base64(user:pass)Where
base64(user:pass)is the base64 encoding of “user:pass”.When the
Authorization: Basicheader cannot be used (for instance, in software like OBS Studio), credentials can be passed through theAuthorization: Bearerheader, where value is the concatenation of username and password, separated by a colon:1Authorization: Bearer username:password -
If JWT-based authentication is in use, the JWT can be passed through the
Authorization: Bearerheader:1Authorization: Bearer MY_JWT
Solving WebRTC connectivity issues
If the server is hosted inside a container or is behind a NAT, additional configuration is required in order to allow the two WebRTC parts (server and client) to establish a connection.
Make sure that webrtcAdditionalHosts includes your public IPs, that are IPs that can be used by clients to reach the server. If clients are on the same LAN as the server, add the LAN address of the server. If clients are coming from the internet, add the public IP address of the server, or alternatively a DNS name, if you have one. You can add multiple values to support all scenarios:
|
|
If there’s a NAT / container between server and clients, it must be configured to route all incoming UDP packets on port 8189 to the server. If you’re using Docker, this can be achieved with the flag:
|
|
If you still have problems, the UDP protocol might be blocked by a firewall. Enable the TCP protocol by enabling the local TCP listener:
|
|
If there’s a NAT / container between server and clients, it must be configured to route all incoming TCP packets on port 8189 to the server.
If you still have problems, add a STUN server. When a STUN server is in use, server IP is obtained automatically and connections are established with the “UDP hole punching” technique, that uses a random UDP port that does not need to be open. For instance:
|
|
If you really still have problems, you can force all WebRTC/ICE connections to pass through a TURN server, like coturn, that must be configured externally. The server address and credentials must be set in the configuration file:
|
|
Where user and pass are the username and password of the server. Note that port is not optional.
If the server uses a secret-based authentication (for instance, coturn with the use-auth-secret option), it must be configured by using AUTH_SECRET as username, and the secret as password:
|
|
where secret is the secret of the TURN server. MediaMTX will generate a set of credentials by using the secret, and credentials will be sent to clients before the WebRTC/ICE connection is established.
In some cases you may want the browser to connect using TURN servers but have mediamtx not using TURN (for example if the TURN server is on the same network as mediamtx). To allow this you can configure the TURN server to be client only:
|
|
Supported browsers
The server can ingest and broadcast with WebRTC a wide variety of video and audio codecs (that are listed at the beginning of the README), but not all browsers can publish and read all codecs due to internal limitations that cannot be overcome by this or any other server.
In particular, reading and publishing H265 tracks with WebRTC was not possible until some time ago due to lack of browser support. The situation improved recently and can be described as following:
-
Safari on iOS and macOS fully supports publishing and reading H265 tracks
-
Chrome on Windows supports publishing and reading H265 tracks when a GPU is present and when the browser is launched with the following flags:
1chrome.exe --enable-features=PlatformHEVCEncoderSupport,WebRtcAllowH265Receive,WebRtcAllowH265Send --force-fieldtrials=WebRTC-Video-H26xPacketBuffer/EnabledWe are expecting these flags to become redundant in the future and the feature to be turned on by default.
You can check what codecs your browser can publish or read with WebRTC by using this tool.
If you want to support most browsers, you can to re-encode the stream by using H264 and Opus codecs, for instance by using FFmpeg:
|
|
HLS-specific features
Supported browsers
The server can produce HLS streams with a variety of video and audio codecs (that are listed at the beginning of the README), but not all browsers can read all codecs due to internal limitations that cannot be overcome by this or any other server.
You can check what codecs your browser can read with HLS by using this tool.
If you want to support most browsers, you can to re-encode the stream by using H264 and AAC codecs, for instance by using FFmpeg:
|
|
RTSP-specific features
Transport protocols
The RTSP protocol supports different underlying transport protocols, that are chosen by clients during the handshake with the server:
- UDP: the most performant, but doesn’t work when there’s a NAT/firewall between server and clients.
- UDP-multicast: allows to save bandwidth when clients are all in the same LAN, by sending packets once to a fixed multicast IP.
- TCP: the most versatile.
The default transport protocol is UDP. To change the transport protocol, you have to tune the configuration of your client of choice.
Encryption
Incoming and outgoing RTSP streams can be encrypted with TLS, obtaining the RTSPS protocol. A TLS certificate is needed and can be generated with OpenSSL:
|
|
Edit mediamtx.yml and set the encryption, serverKey and serverCert parameters:
|
|
Streams can be published and read with the rtsps scheme and the 8322 port:
|
|
Corrupted frames
In some scenarios, when publishing or reading from the server with RTSP, frames can get corrupted. This can be caused by multiple reasons:
-
the write queue of the server is too small and can’t keep up with the stream throughput. A solution consists in increasing its size:
1writeQueueSize: 1024 -
The stream throughput is too big and the stream can’t be transmitted correctly with the UDP transport protocol. UDP is more performant, faster and more efficient than TCP, but doesn’t have a retransmission mechanism, that is needed in case of streams that need a large bandwidth. A solution consists in switching to TCP:
1rtspTransports: [tcp]In case the source is a camera:
1 2 3 4paths: test: source: rtsp://.. rtspTransport: tcp -
The stream throughput is too big to be handled by the network between server and readers. Upgrade the network or decrease the stream bitrate by re-encoding it.
RTMP-specific features
Encryption
RTMP connections can be encrypted with TLS, obtaining the RTMPS protocol. A TLS certificate is needed and can be generated with OpenSSL:
|
|
Edit mediamtx.yml and set the rtmpEncryption, rtmpServerKey and rtmpServerCert parameters:
|
|
Streams can be published and read with the rtmps scheme and the 1937 port:
|
|
Be aware that RTMPS is currently unsupported by all major players. However, you can use a proxy like stunnel or nginx or a dedicated MediaMTX instance to decrypt streams before reading them.
Compile from source
Standard
Install git and Go ≥ 1.24. Clone the repository, enter into the folder and start the building process:
|
|
The command will produce the mediamtx binary.
OpenWrt
The compilation procedure is the same as the standard one. On the OpenWrt device, install git and Go:
|
|
Clone the repository, enter into the folder and start the building process:
|
|
The command will produce the mediamtx binary.
If the OpenWrt device doesn’t have enough resources to compile, you can cross compile from another machine.
Custom libcamera
If you need to use a custom or external libcamera when interacting with the Raspberry Pi Camera, you have to compile mediamtx-rpicamera before compiling the server. Instructions are present in the mediamtx-rpicamera repository.
Cross compile
Cross compilation allows to build an executable for a target machine from another machine with different operating system or architecture. This is useful in case the target machine doesn’t have enough resources for compilation or if you don’t want to install the compilation dependencies on it.
On the machine you want to use to compile, install git and Go ≥ 1.24. Clone the repository, enter into the folder and start the building process:
|
|
Replace my_os and my_arch with the operating system and architecture of your target machine. A list of all supported combinations can be obtained with:
|
|
For instance:
|
|
In case of the arm architecture, there’s an additional flag available, GOARM, that allows to set the ARM version:
|
|
In case of the mips architecture, there’s an additional flag available, GOMIPS, that allows to set additional parameters:
|
|
The command will produce the mediamtx binary.
Compile for all supported platforms
Install Docker and launch:
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The command will produce tarballs in folder binaries/.
Docker image
The official Docker image can be recompiled by following these steps:
-
Build binaries for all supported platforms:
1make binaries -
Build the image by using one of the Dockerfiles inside the
docker/folder:1docker build . -f docker/standard.Dockerfile -t my-mediamtxA Dockerfile is available for each image variant (
standard.Dockerfile,ffmpeg.Dockerfile,rpi.Dockerfile,ffmpeg-rpi.Dockerfile).
License
All the code in this repository is released under the MIT License. Compiled binaries include some third-party dependencies:
- all the Golang-based dependencies listed into the go.mod file, which are all released under either the MIT license, BSD 3-Clause license or Apache License 2.0.
- hls.js, released under the Apache License 2.0.
- mediamtx-rpicamera, which is released under the same license of MediaMTX but includes some third-party dependencies.
Specifications
| name | area |
|---|---|
| RTSP / RTP / RTCP specifications | RTSP |
| HLS specifications | HLS |
| Action Message Format - AMF 0 | RTMP |
| FLV | RTMP |
| RTMP | RTMP |
| Enhanced RTMP v2 | RTMP |
| WebRTC: Real-Time Communication in Browsers | WebRTC |
| RFC8835, Transports for WebRTC | WebRTC |
| RFC7742, WebRTC Video Processing and Codec Requirements | WebRTC |
| RFC7847, WebRTC Audio Codec and Processing Requirements | WebRTC |
| RFC7875, Additional WebRTC Audio Codecs for Interoperability | WebRTC |
| H.265 Profile for WebRTC | WebRTC |
| WebRTC HTTP Ingestion Protocol (WHIP) | WebRTC |
| WebRTC HTTP Egress Protocol (WHEP) | WebRTC |
| The SRT Protocol | SRT |
| Codec specifications | codecs |
| Golang project layout | project layout |
Related projects
- gortsplib (RTSP library used internally)
- gohlslib (HLS library used internally)
- mediacommon (codecs and formats library used internally)
- mediamtx-rpicamera (Raspberry Pi Camera component)
- datarhei/gosrt (SRT library used internally)
- pion/webrtc (WebRTC library used internally)
- pion/sdp (SDP library used internally)
- pion/rtp (RTP library used internally)
- pion/rtcp (RTCP library used internally)
- go-astits (MPEG-TS library used internally)
- go-mp4 (MP4 library used internally)
- hls.js (browser-side HLS library used internally)