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How to live stream a basketball game from your phone, with a scoreboard

One Android phone is enough to put your team’s game on YouTube, Facebook or Twitch with the score, the quarter, the team fouls and the game clock on screen. This guide covers what you need, where to put the phone and how to keep the scoreboard up to date with Calypso while the game is on.

What you need

  • An Android phone and a tripod or a clamp for the stand railing.
  • A power bank. Four quarters plus breaks is a long time to stream on one battery.
  • A good upload connection in the gym. Sports halls are often bad for mobile signal: run a speed test from the spot where you will film, and ask the club for the Wi-Fi if it is better.
  • A channel to stream to. On YouTube, live streaming has to be switched on once and can take up to 24 hours to activate, so do it a day before. Streaming with a stream key, as Calypso does, doesn’t need the 50 subscribers that YouTube’s own app asks for.

Where to put the phone

  • At the halfway line and as high as you can, from the stands or a balcony, on the side opposite the benches so players don’t block the view.
  • In landscape, framing about two thirds of the court, and follow the play from basket to basket by panning.
  • Don’t zoom in much: gyms are darker than they look, and digital zoom makes the picture noisy.

Set up the stream in Calypso

  1. Install Calypso and tell it where you stream: YouTube, Facebook, Twitch or any RTMP server. Paste the stream key once and Calypso keeps it. With Pro, YouTube connects with one tap and no key.
  2. Add the two teams with their badges and players. You only do it once per team.
  3. Open Overlay settings and choose Basketball as the sport. The scoreboard gets room for three-digit scores, the quarter and the team fouls.
  4. Pick the home and away teams and a style for the scoreboard. You can show the starting five before the tip-off.
  5. Set the game clock: it counts down from 10:00 by default (FIBA quarters). For 8-minute quarters or any other length, press and hold the clock and set the time.
  6. Go live a few minutes before the tip-off and check on another phone that the stream looks and sounds right.

During the game

  • Points: each team has +, +2 and +3 for free throws, baskets and three-pointers, and − to fix a mistake.
  • Team fouls: F1 and F2, with + and −. They show on the scoreboard and go back to zero every quarter.
  • The clock: a tap starts or stops it, so you can follow the referee’s whistle. It stops by itself at 00:00, and ↺ puts it back to the start of the quarter.
  • Quarters: the quarter button goes 1Q, 2Q, 3Q, 4Q. Each change resets the clock and the team fouls.
  • Replays (Pro): save a great play and show it again during a time-out.

The scoreboard doesn’t include a shot clock or the time-outs left. Keep it simple: score, fouls, quarter and game clock are what viewers look for.

Before every game

  • Do a short test stream from the gym, with the same phone and connection.
  • Charge the phone and the power bank, and turn on Do Not Disturb so calls don’t interrupt the stream.
  • Check that both teams are set up, that you picked Basketball and that the clock starts at the right time.
  • If the upload in the gym is weak, lower the quality of your stream profile to 720p: a smooth stream is better than a sharp one that stutters.

What it costs

Calypso is free to install and streaming is free, with no ads. Free streams carry a small Calypso mark in a corner. Pro removes it and adds replays and one-tap YouTube for 5,99 € a month or 49,99 € a year.

Get it on Google Play

Free to install. Pro and Max are bought inside the app.