Raspberry Pi

Set up pi-webrtc on a Raspberry Pi and watch the camera in your browser. This guide uses WHEP, so you do not need any server.

1. Install Raspberry Pi OS複製段落連結

Use Raspberry Pi Imager to write Raspberry Pi OS Lite (64-bit) to the SD card. In the Imager settings, turn on SSH and set up Wi-Fi.

Start the Pi and log in over SSH. Check that the OS is Trixie:

grep VERSION_CODENAME /etc/os-release

It should print VERSION_CODENAME=trixie.

2. Connect the camera複製段落連結

Connect a CSI camera or a USB camera. You do not need to change /boot/firmware/config.txt.

CSI camera. Check that the Pi can see it:

rpicam-hello --list-cameras

USB camera. Install the V4L2 tools and list the cameras:

sudo apt install v4l-utils
v4l2-ctl --list-devices

Find your camera in the list and note its first /dev/videoN device. For example, /dev/video0 means --camera=v4l2:0.

3. Install pi-webrtc複製段落連結

Install the libraries that pi-webrtc needs:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install libmosquitto1 pulseaudio libavformat61 libyaml-cpp0.8

Download the latest release and unpack it:

wget https://github.com/mazupo/pi-webrtc/releases/latest/download/pi-webrtc_raspios-trixie-arm64.tar.gz
tar -xzf pi-webrtc_raspios-trixie-arm64.tar.gz

Check that it runs:

./pi-webrtc -h

You should see a list of options. If you see cannot execute binary file or a missing library, see Troubleshooting.

4. Start streaming複製段落連結

CSI camera:

./pi-webrtc --camera=libcamera:0 --uid=my-pi --no-audio --use-whep

USB camera. Replace 0 with your camera number from step 2:

./pi-webrtc --camera=v4l2:0 --v4l2-format=mjpeg --uid=my-pi --no-audio --use-whep

Most USB cameras send mjpeg. To see the formats your camera supports, run v4l2-ctl -d /dev/video0 --list-formats-ext.

pi-webrtc now waits for viewers on port 8080. Leave it running.

5. Watch in your browser複製段落連結

1. Find the IP address of the Pi: hostname -I.
2. On a computer in the same network, open http://app.mazupo.com/whep.
3. Enter http://<pi-ip>:8080 as the WHEP URL, and connect.

Open the player with http://, not https://. The Pi answers over plain HTTP, and browsers block that from an https:// page. If the browser asks to access devices on your local network, click Allow.

6. Make the video sharper複製段落連結

The default video is 640×480 at 30 fps. Stop pi-webrtc with Ctrl+C, and start it with a larger size:

./pi-webrtc --camera=libcamera:0 --width=1280 --height=720 --fps=60 --hw-accel --uid=my-pi --no-audio --use-whep

--hw-accel uses the hardware video encoder of the Pi 3, Pi 4 and Zero 2. The Pi 5 has no hardware encoder, so pi-webrtc encodes in software there. You can use the flag on every model.

Next steps複製段落連結

• Watch from anywhere with MQTT
• Let many people watch through an SFU
• Start pi-webrtc when the Pi boots
• Learn more about cameras