The State of Live Video Streaming

When Twitter acquired Periscope in 2015, the possibility to stream live video from and to your phone was a real innovation. At the time of the acquisition, Periscope hadn’t even launched yet and when it did, it quickly trended among early adopters and the broader tech community. Having reportedly paid slightly less than $100 million, Twitter’s decision to move in before Periscope had even publicly launched its app looked like a smart move at the time.

Two years later, it can safely be said that the company was right in betting on live video. The only problem is: everyone else is doing it as well. As of this moment, Facebook, Snapchat, YouTube and Instagram all feature live video broadcasting and, according to data from UBS Evidence Lab, each of the first three is used more frequently than Twitter to stream live video.