Steam Next Fest Checklist: Everything I’d Prepare Before the Event

FIRSTLY, Are you actually ready?

This is a touchy subject, but many developers LAUNCH their demo at Next Fest without a public or closed beta. This is a mistake.

You should treat Next Fest as an actual launch not a test/ play-tester event. Make sure your game is solid first - if you have to skip the event, do so.

A single game can enter Steam Next Fest only once - make it count!

Start with eligibility. Valve's Next Fest documentation requires a public base-game store page and a playable demo. A game can participate in only one Next Fest edition, so choose the event deliberately. The dates and submission deadlines change by edition; read the page for the specific event rather than reusing last year's checklist.

The demo has its own App ID. The broadcast should target the base game's App ID, not the demo's App ID. This is one of those tiny configuration details that can cost you an afternoon.

I would check the capsule art, screenshots, opening trailer, tags and short description on the main game page as well. If the stream draws attention but the page looks unfinished, you've solved the wrong problem.

Remember that Next fest registration needs to be locked in several months before the event on the Steam Backend

Ok, you are happy, your game plays well, what's next? I've seen developers plan an entire festival campaign and leave the stream setup for the last afternoon. I wouldn't do that. Steam Broadcasting has a handful of settings that are easy to miss, and an invisible stream isn't much use to your wishlist campaign.

Check your Steam broadcasting account

Steam requires an unrestricted account, generally one that has spent at least US$5 on Steam, and the account must own the game. It needs suitable broadcasting authorization through Steamworks or Steam's broadcast group. Don't share the RTMP token with anyone; Valve explicitly treats it as a credential.

Go to Steam's broadcast upload page, configure the base App ID and generate your token. Start with Friends Only visibility for testing, then switch to Public once you're ready. Friends Only broadcasts don't appear on the public store page.

The official setup guide also recommends creating a Live-Stream/Broadcast Steam event and adding the broadcasting account in that event's Broadcasting tab. The account creating the event and the broadcasting account need to be friends for that workflow.

Steam says a stream associated with an event can take up to five minutes to appear on the store page. Start early. It feels like a long five minutes when someone is waiting for you.

What I'd do during the festival

Put the link to the main store page in your social posts, press messages and Discord announcements. Keep the call to action simple: play the demo, then wishlist the main game if they want to follow its release.

Next Fest streams now live in a separate developer livestream tab, not an official featured stream that automatically guarantees homepage prominence. That distinction matters when you're planning expectations.

After the event

I built BroadcastLoop for the part where you want gameplay on Steam without babysitting OBS on your workstation. Give it a go if that sounds familiar.