Running a 24/7 Lo-Fi Radio Stream from a VPS in 2026

The lo-fi hip hop radio format has proven remarkably durable — relaxed music combined with an animated loop visual generates passive viewership that accumulates to significant channel growth over months. The catch: manual 24/7 Twitch or YouTube streaming is impractical. This entire setup runs unattended on a VPS.

What You Need

• A VPS (2 vCores, 2 GB RAM minimum for streaming)
• DMCA-safe music library (see below)
• A looping visual (animated .mp4 or generated frames)
• ffmpeg (software encoding)

ffmpeg-Based Stream Loop

The simplest possible approach — no OBS required:

#!/bin/bash
# stream_loop.sh

RTMP_KEY="your_twitch_or_youtube_stream_key"
RTMP_URL="rtmp://live.twitch.tv/live"

# Loop the video indefinitely and stream
ffmpeg -re \
  -stream_loop -1 \                    # Loop video infinitely
  -i /home/stream/lofi_visual.mp4 \    # Your animated visual
  -stream_loop -1 \
  -i /home/stream/music_concat.mp3 \   # Your music concatenated
  -c:v libx264 -preset veryfast -b:v 6000k \
  -c:a aac -b:a 160k \
  -f flv "$RTMP_URL/$RTMP_KEY"

Run with PM2:

pm2 start stream_loop.sh --name lofi-stream
pm2 save

Building Your Music Library

DMCA-safe music options:

• Chillhop Music — Explicit permission for streams under their specific terms
• StreamBeats (Harris Heller) — Royalty-free, created specifically for streams
• Monstercat Gold — Licence covers streaming with monthly subscription
• Artlist.io — Annual licence covering streaming rights
• Your own music — Commission tracks from royalty-free composers

Avoid: any playlist or library that doesn't explicitly state streaming rights. YouTube's Content ID and Twitch's automated DMCA detection will mute VoDs.

Concatenating Your Music Library

# Create a file list for ffmpeg:
ls /home/stream/music/*.mp3 > /tmp/music_list.txt

# Prepend 'file' to each line:
sed -i "s/^/file '/" /tmp/music_list.txt
sed -i "s/$/'/" /tmp/music_list.txt

# Concatenate all files into one:
ffmpeg -f concat -safe 0 -i /tmp/music_list.txt \
  -c copy /home/stream/music_concat.mp3

Playlist Randomiser

For variety, shuffle the track order each stream cycle:

# Random shuffle with shuf:
ls /home/stream/music/*.mp3 | shuf | \
  sed "s/^/file '/" | sed "s/$/'/" > /tmp/music_list.txt

Space-Node VPS plans include 2 vCores suitable for ffmpeg x264 encoding at 6 Mbps bitrate with CPU headroom for additional processes.

Start your 24/7 lo-fi stream on Space-Node VPS