Consistently at the forefront when it comes to integrated streaming tools, Streamlabs OBS now provides an overlay tool for single monitor streamers. Live streamers can now see their chat and in-stream events as an overlay at the front of their screens (without interrupting their flow to switch between windows on a cluttered desktop).
Never interrupt your live stream again by following this quick guide on how to set up the Game Overlay for Streamlabs.
Setting Up
Firstly, open Streamlabs (if you don’t already have it, you can download and install it from the Streamlabs website) and then select the settings tab from the bottom-left corner.
From the settings menu, select the “Game Overlay” tab.
Once in this menu, enable the in-game overlay.
From here you can choose recent events and/or the chat to be displayed on the overlay. There’s also the option to change the overlay opacity (you can make it more see-through depending on your preferences).
Now for the fun part! It’s time to use “Toggle Positioning Mode.”
Enable this mode to easily adjust the overlay on your screen. Drag and drop the panels wherever you see fit (if you change your mind you can adjust them anytime via the settings menu).
Now you must set hotkeys to toggle the overlay. Hotkeys are the only way to turn the overlay on/off outside of positioning mode.
To do this, navigate to the “Hotkeys” tab in the settings menu. Select “Toggle in-game overlay” and press a key to bind it (we’d recommend picking a hotkey that you’re unlikely to trigger accidentally whilst gaming).
After setting your hotkeys, try toggling them on and off to test the game overlay.
And that’s it!
*Please note you need to run your game in borderless-windowed or windowed-fullscreen mode in order for the overlay to work properly. It doesn’t currently work with games run in fullscreen mode.
How to Fix the Cookies Display Issue
When loading up the Game Overlay for the first time, you may be inconvenienced by the Twitch cookie notification blocking most of your chat window.
This is a simple fix. Simply open the Twitch chat from within Streamlabs (via the right-hand arrow seen to the side of the software).
Once the chat is open, you should see the same notification.
Click accept/manage to get rid of the notification. From here, you will need to go back to the Game Overlay and turn it off.
Turn it back on again to see the updated chat window in the overlay.
If you encounter any other issues, try updating to the latest version of Streamlabs, or visit the Streamlabs FAQ.
Wrapping Up
The Streamlabs Game Overlay is an incredibly useful tool for single-monitor streamers. With streaming software, Discord, and other necessary apps cluttering our screens at any one time, finding a way to simplify reading notifications is invaluable.
If you’re new to streaming, check out more of our handy tutorials below.
