When it comes to building a setup for streaming, there are so many options to choose from.
A streamer's desk setup should be clean, look great on camera and be powerful enough to multitask with.
So what are some of the essentials that you need to stream for a desk setup?
In this article, we will explore exactly what you'll be needing for your streaming room and how you can build it up to be high-quality for your viewers.
Let's dive in!
Below are 7 different streaming setups to gain inspiration from.
Just remember, these are setups that many have put a lot of time and effort into building up.
You will be able to get to this level over time, it will just take a while.
A monitor arm mount is a good mounting option if you want to stream because it clears up a ton of space.
It helps your desk setup look better and more organized, and you can build it so that it holds a dual monitor setup or one big curved monitor.
With a monitor mount, you can also tilt, swivel, and rotate your monitors till you're happy with them ergonomically.
The monitor arm that I think is best, and is quite budget-friendly is the VIVO Dual Monitor Arm which works like a charm!
Alongside your monitor arms, ensuring you have 2 monitors (or 1 big curved monitor) should be essential.
One thing that makes your stream top-quality is your ability to constantly interact with your viewers while you're gaming.
Naturally, it would be better to build a dual monitor setup - 1 monitor for you to game on, and the other to monitor your stream's chat.
You will often find that the best streamers always give thanks to those who subscribe or donate to their streams.
Doing this makes your audience feel acknowledged, which is a great feeling and keeps them engaged.
If you stream FPS games like VALORANT, Call of Duty, or CS:GO, then you will find that these monitors will serve you very well.
Lighting is important for streamers because they need to be seen clearly.
Lighting also can make an impact on the mood of your stream…
For example, a blue background can make your setup feel calm, cool, and collected.
Whereas a red background can make your stream look more intense, and out for blood.
You will also want to have a well-lit room or a light that is directly facing you, so you can be seen as clear as day.
You don't have to go crazy with lighting, but getting some colored lighting like using a Philips Hue Light for the background can be beneficial and you can set it to different colors depending on the mood you're in.
Additionally, you could get a green screen and set some clever, or funny backgrounds - and lighting would still be important to ensure that it's clear to see.
Most streamers won't be needing a full-sized keyboard since the right-side keypad is barely used.
Do you fall under this category?
If so, buying a more compact keyboard (TKL-sized or less) would be better as it can save you some more room to move around your mouse.
This is especially good if you play FPS games as the more mouse room you have, the better.
Ensuring that it's mechanical is also important as mechanical keyboards can actuate faster, they’re more satisfying to type on and some are specifically made for gaming.
The streamer needs to be comfortable in their streaming setup room because, for most, it’s their home away from home.
If you're serious about growing your stream, you will be spending a ton of time with the camera on, playing your favorite games.
That also means you will be sitting on your chair for a long, long time.
Gaming chairs are great for streamers because they have more comfort features, like a slight back tilt, a wide bottom to sit cross-legged, and cushions to support your back and neck.
Chairs are one of those things that you can't really tell is a game-changer until you try it…
So I suggest going to your local PC shop and testing out their gaming chairs.
From personal experience, the best chairs to sit on for streaming for long hours are Secret Lab chairs or Noble Chairs.
If you want a chair that's comfortable enough to sleep on - these are your best picks.
As an FPS gamer myself, it's extremely annoying and detrimental to my gameplay if I have a limited amount of mouse room to play around with.
Ensuring you have enough desk space can help with that, and also help with giving you more peace of mind.
Put away any unnecessary files, papers, and books and only have the essentials on your desk, like your monitors, mouse, keyboard.
You may want to add some subtle things like some plants, but just make sure it doesn’t become an inconvenience.
This way you don't have to worry about your mouse bumping into anything on your desk, and you have full maneuverability.
One of the more budget-friendly adjustable desks is the SHW Adjustable Desk.
As a streamer, you shouldn't stream without a quality microphone.
A streamer relies heavily on audio as part of their streaming experience and it's important for viewers to hear you clearly.
The last thing you would want is to have a muffled or static-y mic that hurts the ears.
That's a one-way ticket to having viewers exit your stream within the first 5 seconds.
For most of the items used for building a streaming setup, you can get away with grabbing the budget version for now.
But when it comes to your mic, ensure you don't skimp out on getting one that's quality.
At the very least, get the Blue Snowball iCe Microphone, as this will give you some crisp audio.
One way streamers can protect their eyes is by wearing blue-light-blocking glasses.
Blue light blocking glasses are a must-have for streamers because they protect your eyes from your monitor especially if you're gaming for hours on end.
The thing is, you may not feel as if your eyes are getting damaged - and that's the point…
Damage to your eyes is subtle and occurs over a long period of time.
So for your long-term health, it's a good move to grab some blue-light-blocking glasses.
It will help with further reducing the blue light, and even being blinded by bright backgrounds on OBS or other programs you’re looking at when streaming.
The blue light blocking glasses I recommend are these ones here.
As you start to deck out your stream, you need to ensure that your desk stays clean.
The best way to do that is to buy stands for your accessories.
For example, getting a phone stand so you can keep your phone upright…
Or getting a headphone stand so you have a proper place to rest your headphones instead of hanging them on your monitor.
Grabbing these subtle accessories make your desk look cleaner and tidier...
And would prevent you from laying a bunch of your accessories down flat on your table, which can be annoying.
Although your viewers won't necessarily see your setup, it's always good to ensure you've put in the hard yards to properly cable manage your setup.
It makes your setup easier to clean and maintain, and you will have more peace of mind knowing that your setup is clutter-free.
Pro Tip: As you get more popular, people will naturally start to wonder about what kind of setup you have. You can create a video doing a 'Room Tour' about your setup and include affiliate links to those products in the description of your video. This is a great way to earn some additional income. For example, check out Tfue's 'Room Tour' video.
Most of the time, you will be streaming for hours at a time and interacting with your stream chat constantly.
It's important that you have the best tools to make your stream better, and that's where getting a stream deck can make your life away easier.
The Elgato Stream Deck prevents streamers from having to use a browser while browsing chat windows and improving the stream quality on Twitch.
You can customize each button and assign it to do a specific action, like changing the music, capturing replay footage, turning on your PC performance, etc.
That's just the tip of the iceberg, there are millions of different ways to make use of your stream deck, which we won't be able to get into in this article.
Just know that once you get the hang of it, it will make doing certain, repetitive actions 100x easier - and at the click of a button.
If you want a deeper dive into some great accessories to add to your setup, feel free to check out our previous article!
Here are some desks that twitch-famous streamers use:
The two types of desks I would recommend for your setup are custom building an IKEA desk using a tabletop and drawers like in this example...
Or grabbing this adjustable desk here.
The bare essentials for a streaming setup will be these:
These will get you started for now.
The best setup for a streamer is one that you upgrade over time as you grow.
If you have the funds to do so, you can buy some great equipment (lighting, gaming chair, dual monitor, powerful PC, etc.) yet it's not essential...
Growing a channel takes time, we did a detailed case study of how much an average twitch streamer makes based on their viewer count - check it out.
So start off with the bare essentials (listed above) and then as your stream grows, so can the quality of your stream.
By now you should have a decent idea of how to build your desk setup for streaming.
If you have any recommendations or want to showcase your streaming setup, feel free to comment down below with your stream name so we can follow you!
Happy streaming!