Before building your HLS streaming server, ensure you have the following:
HLS (HTTP Live Streaming) enables you to serve video content over standard HTTP, with adaptive bitrate support for smooth playback across devices and network conditions.
The RTMP module allows Nginx to receive live video streams via the RTMP protocol and convert them to HLS on the fly. You can either compile from source or use a prebuilt package.
Option 1: Install via package (Ubuntu/Debian)
sudo apt update
sudo apt install nginx libnginx-mod-rtmp -yOption 2: Compile from source
sudo apt install build-essential libpcre3-dev libssl-dev zlib1g-dev -y
git clone https://github.com/arut/nginx-rtmp-module.git
wget http://nginx.org/download/nginx-1.24.0.tar.gz
tar -xzf nginx-1.24.0.tar.gz
cd nginx-1.24.0
./configure --with-http_ssl_module --add-module=../nginx-rtmp-module
make && sudo make installAfter installation, verify Nginx is running with systemctl status nginx.
Edit your /etc/nginx/nginx.conf file and add the RTMP and HLS configuration blocks. This setup enables both live streaming and VOD capabilities with proper CORS headers for cross-origin access.
rtmp {
server {
listen 1935;
chunk_size 4096;
application live {
live on;
record off;
hls on;
hls_path /var/www/html/hls;
hls_fragment 3;
hls_playlist_length 60;
}
}
}
http {
server {
listen 80;
server_name your-domain.com;
location /hls {
types {
application/vnd.apple.mpegurl m3u8;
video/mp2t ts;
}
root /var/www/html;
add_header Cache-Control no-cache;
add_header 'Access-Control-Allow-Origin' '*';
add_header 'Access-Control-Allow-Methods' 'GET, POST, OPTIONS';
}
}
}Restart Nginx after making changes: sudo systemctl restart nginx. The CORS headers are critical for web players like ours to access your HLS streams.
FFmpeg is the industry-standard tool for encoding and streaming video. Use the following commands to push live streams or convert existing videos to HLS.
Push a live RTMP stream to your server:
ffmpeg -re -i input.mp4 \
-c:v libx264 -preset veryfast -b:v 3000k \
-c:a aac -b:a 128k -f flv \
rtmp://your-server-ip/live/streamConvert a VOD file to HLS segments directly:
ffmpeg -i video.mp4 \
-c:v libx264 -c:a aac \
-hls_time 6 -hls_list_size 0 \
-hls_segment_filename 'segment_%03d.ts' \
output.m3u8For adaptive bitrate streaming, encode multiple quality levels and create a master playlist referencing each variant playlist.
Once your server is configured and streaming, test it using our free M3U8 Player:
https://your-domain.com/hls/stream.m3u8)You can also test with VLC, ffplay, or any HLS-compatible player. If the stream fails, check your firewall (ports 80 and 1935 must be open), Nginx error logs, and CORS headers.
For production use, consider adding SSL/TLS (Let's Encrypt) and securing your RTMP endpoint with authentication. For more details on troubleshooting, see our Troubleshooting Guide.
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