How to Create a New Scene in OBS Studio

Creating scenes in OBS Studio is the foundation of setting up your live streams or video recordings. This guide provides a quick, step-by-step walkthrough on how to create a new scene, organize your sources, and transition between different layouts to elevate your production quality.

Step 1: Locate the Scenes Dock

Open OBS Studio on your computer. By default, the Scenes dock is located in the bottom-left corner of the screen. If you do not see it, go to the top menu, click Docs, and ensure Scenes is checked.

Step 2: Add a New Scene

At the bottom of the Scenes dock, click the + (plus) icon. Alternatively, you can right-click anywhere within the empty space of the Scenes dock and select Add.

Step 3: Name Your Scene

A pop-up window will appear prompting you to name your new scene. Type a descriptive name that helps you easily identify it during a broadcast (for example, “Gameplay,” “Just Chatting,” or “Be Right Back”) and click OK. Your new scene will now appear in the Scenes list.

Step 4: Add Sources to Your Scene

A new scene starts as a blank black canvas. To display content, select your newly created scene, move to the adjacent Sources dock, and click the + icon to add visual and audio elements. You can add a Video Capture Device (your webcam), Display Capture (your monitor), Game Capture, or static images.

Managing Your Scenes

• Switching Scenes: Click on any scene in the list to instantly switch to it.
• Reordering Scenes: Click and drag a scene up or down in the list to organize them.
• Duplicating Scenes: Right-click a scene and select Duplicate to copy its layout and sources, which is useful for creating variations of a setup.
• Deleting Scenes: Select the scene you want to remove and click the trash can icon at the bottom of the dock, or press the Delete key on your keyboard.