Over the past few years, the 24 hour live stream has gotten more and more popular on sites like Twitch. Streamers choose to run these events for various reasons but the main ones are usually related to charity or to celebrate a major milestone on their channel. Preparation is absolutely vital for a successful stream (read: marathon) so that’s why we’ve prepared some important pointers below.
1. Eat and Drink Well
Like running a marathon, you’ll want to eat foods that won’t make you tired and keep you going. You’ll want to eat foods rich in carbs or proteins like pasta, rice, oatmeal, toast, eggs, veggies, and more. Stay away from heavy food that will make you want to take a nap. As for snacks, stay away from sugary stuff and go for something like fruit or trail mix since it will usually have some protein in it.
On the drinking side of things, you’ll want to be actively drinking water throughout the day. No one said you had to be at your desk for the full 24 hours so bathroom breaks are totally fine. If you’re sick of water, Gatorade or even tea is another good alternative. Stay away from caffeine or energy drinks – those will make you crash.
2. Sleep Time
You’re about to stay up for 24 hours straight, you better get at least 8 hours of sleep in beforehand if you want to make it all the way through. You’ll also want to start almost right after you wake up to maximize your time awake. We’d recommend waking up earlier in the morning, spending about an hour to do any last minute preparation, and then starting.
3. Keep it Fresh
Start to plan out your day by creating a schedule. Keep it loose though since the realistic chances of you sticking to a tight schedule on a 24 hour time span is probably slim. But work in giveaways (especially if you’re doing a charity stream), when you’re going to switch up the game, rough times to eat larger meals, and anything else. These kind of breaks in your schedule will also give you time to relax and regroup as well.
4. Test, Test, and more Testing
The day before the stream, you should be testing all of your equipment. If you’re playing more than one game then you should check they display correctly on stream and are receiving audio. If you’re playing on more than one console then you’ll want to check each console as well. Don’t leave anything unchecked! You can never be too prepared going into a day full of streaming.
5. Get the Word Out
Talk to your viewers and other streamers before the date. If you need some networking pointers, look here. Let them know you’re about to do a 24 hour stream and see if they can support in anyway – tweeting, hosting, etc. Any support is appreciated no matter how big or how small.
You should also prep some tweets beforehand and perhaps even consider scheduling them with something like Tweetdeck. We say this because you’re going to be in the moment and busy for a while so you very well may just forget to keep the promotion going.
6. Take it Easy
This is the last tip but might be one of the more important ones. It’s okay to fall short of the 24 hours if you’re tired or not feeling well. The key here is that you tried and attempted to do something out of the box for your viewers and/or a charity. Don’t ever feel bad about taking a break too. Your health should supersede the stream itself and don’t forget that. Also, don’t worry about not streaming the following day if you’re still tired or out of it. Your viewers will understand.
Last but certainly not least, have fun! Keeping your enthusiasm up for 24 hours is ridiculously hard but there’s a good chance that viewers in your 2nd hour won’t be around in your 12th hour. With that said, they might be entirely new viewers to your channel so keep that in mind as this event could be a big opportunity for your channel to grow.
Well, that’s going to do it for this guide. Did we miss something? Got a suggestion? Hit us up in our Discord and let us know! Good luck and have fun out there.
