Last updated: 2026-01-15

For most social media managers in the U.S., StreamYard is the most practical default for recording, repurposing, and publishing social-ready videos without wrestling with complex software. If you need deep control over encoding, scenes, and a fully free desktop app—and you’re comfortable with tech—OBS can be a useful alternative.

Summary

• StreamYard gives you a browser-based studio with recording-only mode, AI-assisted clips, and direct publishing to major social platforms.
• You can record in vertical 9:16, capture high-quality local 4K video and 48kHz audio per participant, and keep branding consistent across episodes.
• OBS offers powerful, free local recording and scene creation but expects more setup and ongoing tweaking.
• For most social media teams, time saved on setup and repurposing with StreamYard outweighs the extra dials and knobs in other tools.

What do social media managers actually need from recording software?

If you manage social channels, your job isn’t to obsess over codecs—it’s to ship content that performs. In practice, that usually means:

• High-quality audio and video that still looks good after platform compression.
• Simple workflows so you can batch content, not babysit settings.
• Easy collaboration with hosts, guests, and stakeholders.
• Brand consistency: overlays, colors, and layouts that match your visual identity.

At StreamYard, we built a browser-based studio specifically to reduce friction here. You can open a studio in your browser, invite a guest with a link, hit record-only, and walk away with content ready for editing or direct publishing. How to create a recording.

Why is StreamYard a strong default for social teams?

For most social media managers, the convenient path is the one that gets you from idea to published post with the fewest steps.

Key reasons StreamYard fits that role:

• No installs, just a link. Everything runs in the browser, so you and your guests join from a link instead of installing software.
• Record-only studios. You can create dedicated recording sessions without going live, designed for producing “professional quality recordings easily.” How to create a recording.
• Per-participant local recording. Local recording captures individual audio/video files for each participant, which significantly improves your post-production options when you want to create multiple formats or fix issues in editing. Local recording.
• High-fidelity masters. Local recordings can go up to 4K and capture uncompressed 48kHz WAV audio per participant, giving you clean masters for later editing.
• Integrated cloud backup. On paid plans, live streams and studio sessions are recorded in the cloud with generous per-stream caps, so you have a safety net even if a local file fails. Screen recording software overview.
• Recording caps that match real workflows. The free plan includes 2 hours per month of local recording, while paid plans offer unlimited local recording hours, which is usually enough even for busy weekly content calendars. Local recording limits.

In practical terms, that means you can plan a one-hour interview with a founder, record clean local tracks for each speaker, and walk away with:

• A hero YouTube video
• A polished LinkedIn post
• Multiple vertical clips for Reels and TikTok

—all from one session.

How do you handle vertical video for TikTok and Reels?

Vertical is no longer optional. Most social managers need at least some 9:16 content every week.

StreamYard supports a dedicated Portrait Mode that lets you stream or record in a vertical 9:16 aspect ratio, which is ideal for Instagram Live, TikTok-style videos, and Reels. Portrait Mode.

What this means for your workflow:

• You can set up a vertical studio from the start instead of cropping a horizontal video later.
• On-screen layouts, overlays, and branding all respect the 9:16 canvas.
• Guests still join via link; they don’t need to understand aspect ratios.

Combine this with AI Clips—which uses prompt-based selection to surface potential highlights—and you get a repeatable process: record in portrait, generate a set of candidates for short clips, then refine the winners in your editor of choice.

How can you batch-record and repurpose for YouTube, Facebook, and LinkedIn?

Batching is where social media managers win back their time.

With StreamYard, a common workflow looks like this:

1. Block a 2–3 hour window once a week.
2. Record multiple segments in a recording-only studio—Q&A, product tips, interviews.
3. Use AI Clips to identify highlight moments that look promising for shorts, Reels, and teaser posts.
4. Edit within StreamYard for fast turnarounds when you just need clean trims.
5. Publish long-form videos directly to YouTube channels and Facebook Pages, up to 2 hours in length. Publishing long-form videos.
6. Send shorter clips (up to 20 minutes) straight to LinkedIn without leaving the platform. LinkedIn publishing.

Our approach to editing is intentional: in-app tools and AI features help you move quickly, but deep editorial work—multi-track mastering, structural changes, detailed color work—is still best handled in dedicated editors. We focus on getting you high-quality source material and a head start, not replacing pro editing software.

StreamYard vs. OBS: Which recording workflow fits social media teams?

Many social media managers eventually ask whether they should use a browser-based studio or a desktop app like OBS.

Where OBS is appealing:

• It is free and open source for video recording and live streaming, and runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux. OBS overview.
• You can create scenes from multiple sources—screen captures, webcams, browser windows, images, text—and switch between them with custom transitions.
• It offers extensive configuration over encoders and output formats for those who want low-level control.

Where StreamYard is usually a better fit for social media managers:

• OBS expects you to manage local scenes, audio routing, and file organization yourself, whereas our browser-based studio emphasizes fast setup, simple guest onboarding, and automatic cloud backups.
• StreamYard’s local per-participant recording is purpose-built for interview and panel content, while similar multi-track setups in desktop apps require more manual configuration.
• Vertical presets and direct publishing to YouTube, Facebook Pages, and LinkedIn are designed around social-specific outputs, reducing the number of tools and steps you need. Publishing long-form videos.

A useful rule of thumb: choose OBS when you explicitly want to tinker with scenes and encoder settings and are comfortable learning a more technical tool. Choose StreamYard when you care more about getting reliable, on-brand content out the door every week with minimal overhead.

How should you think about recording limits, storage, and quality?

Recording and storage caps matter when you’re planning long-form shows or high-volume production.

On StreamYard:

• The free plan includes 2 hours per month of local recording; paid plans provide unlimited local recording hours, subject to reasonable use. Local recording limits.
• Paid plans automatically record streams in the cloud, with per-stream caps designed to accommodate long-form sessions, plus plan-based permanent storage for ongoing libraries. Screen recording software overview.
• Local recordings can reach 4K resolution with uncompressed 48kHz WAV audio per participant, giving you plenty of headroom for platform compression later.

From a social manager’s perspective, that typically covers:

• Weekly live shows that run 45–90 minutes.
• Webinar-style content that you later slice into blog embeds, YouTube playlists, and short-form posts.
• Evergreen explainer libraries that need consistent branding and quality.

If you ever hit storage caps, it’s usually a sign you should tighten your archive strategy: export masters to your own storage, keep current working files in StreamYard, and delete what you no longer need frequent access to.

What we recommend

• Use StreamYard as your primary recording hub if you are a social media manager focused on consistency, collaboration, and repurposing across YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and vertical platforms.
• Lean on recording-only studios, portrait mode, local multi-track recording, and AI Clips to batch content in one sitting and create multiple outputs from a single session.
• Bring in a dedicated editor (Premiere Pro, Final Cut, DaVinci, etc.) when you need deeper structural or visual edits beyond what in-app trimming and AI tools provide.
• Consider OBS only when you have very specific technical needs (complex scenes, custom encoders) and the time and expertise to manage a desktop-first workflow.