YouTube

A YouTube video can be a slide like any other. It plays in one of two ways: Streaming straight from YouTube, or Downloaded to this computer and played from the file. Streaming is quicker to set up; downloaded is safer. If a video has to play on the day, download it.

Adding a YouTube video

Press the chain button Link on the presentation’s title bar, or right-click the title bar and choose Link. The Add Link (YouTube / Web) window opens. Paste the address and press OK. The new slide goes to the end of that presentation, with the badge YouTube.

Any of these works: youtu.be/… · youtube.com/watch?v=… · /embed/… · /shorts/… · /live/… — or just the 11-character video ID.

Until YouTube’s title arrives, the slide is named with the video ID. The title fills itself in a moment later, when the internet is there. The card shows YouTube’s thumbnail, cut to the shape of the video and framed the way it will go out. LayerCue keeps a copy once it has shown it, so the card keeps its picture without the internet.

Pasting works too. Copy the address and press ⌘V / Ctrl+V while the slide list has focus. Here the address has to start with http:// or https://. The slide goes in right after the selected slide, or at the end if none is selected.

An AI app connected to LayerCue can also search YouTube and add the video you choose — see Connect an AI app.

Streaming or downloaded

A new YouTube slide streams. Download it and it can play either way — you switch with two chips in Slide settings.

	Streaming	Downloaded
Internet on the day	Needed	Not needed
On stage	One streaming YouTube at a time, on any layer	Like any video file — on any layer, alongside others
Scale	Fill, Stretch and Fit — no Fit + blur bg (a slide that was set to it shows as Fit)	All four, as for a video
Crop & fit (crop, Anchor)	— (the picture always sits in the middle)	○
In a video box	○ — without a crop or a blurred margin	○
Text boxes and shapes on top	Once it sits in a video box	○
Captions · Audio (dubbed tracks)	○	— (the file has no captions and one sound track)
Set as thumbnail	— (the card shows YouTube’s thumbnail)	○
Sound goes to	The device chosen in the speaker box in the status bar — see Sound	The same device

Playback speed, In point · Out point, Slide volume, Repeat and chapters can be set either way.

Downloading

1. Load the slide into Slide settings on the right: Option-click / Alt-click its card, or click the name row under the card. (A plain click on the thumbnail sends it out instead.)
2. Press Download beside the picture in Slide settings.
3. Downloading 42% counts up. If the video needs converting, Converting 42% follows. The ✕ beside it stops the download.
4. When it is done, the slide switches to Downloaded by itself, and its card badge reads YouTube ↓.

Keep that slide in Slide settings until it finishes

The finished file is attached to the slide that is in Slide settings at that moment. Load another slide there before it finishes and the file is not attached — the slide still shows Download, and pressing it fetches the whole video again. A 4K video that needs converting can take a long while, so start it when you can wait.

Once a slide has a download, Download gives way to two chips, Streaming and Downloaded. The lit one is how the slide plays. Switch whenever you like. Go back to Streaming and the card shows YouTube’s thumbnail again.

The file goes into the media folder. Where that is: Where your files live.

Removing the download

Right-click the card → Delete → Delete download. It appears only on a YouTube slide that has a downloaded file. The slide stays and goes back to streaming. The file goes to the Trash / Recycle Bin, unless another slide still uses it.

Downloading again always fetches a fresh copy with the settings you have now. It never reuses the old file.

If the file disappears

If the downloaded file is deleted or moved outside LayerCue, the slide falls back to streaming — which needs the internet. To get a file again, choose Delete download, then Download.

Download settings

In Settings › Files & YouTube. They apply to the next download; videos already downloaded keep their file.

Setting	Choices	What it does
Download quality	Best · 1080p (the default) · 720p	The highest resolution it fetches. If the video does not go that high, it takes the best it has
Convert to H.264	When needed (the default) · Always · Never	Turns the downloaded video into H.264 so it plays lightly

When needed converts only when the video did not arrive as H.264 (or HEVC). Up to 1080p it usually arrives as H.264, so there is nothing to convert; 4K usually needs it. The app sums up the trade-off itself: Converting a 4K clip takes ~20 min; skipping it costs CPU at playback. And for quality: If the projector is 1080p, 4K only costs time and transcoding.

On stage

Sending a YouTube slide out, and taking it down, work as for any slide — see Layers.

• It can go on any layer — background, foreground or an overlay. The layer chip on the card works as it does for a video.
• Only one streaming YouTube can be on stage at a time. LayerCue has a single YouTube player, shared by every layer (other monitors get silent copies of it — see below). To show two YouTube videos together, download them — a downloaded one plays like any video file.
• It can play in a video box. In the editor’s Background row, Make it a video box shrinks the YouTube into a box you can move and resize, with text and shapes around it and on top of it. The box stays when you switch between Streaming and Downloaded. See Design tools.
• On the background, a streaming YouTube comes in with a cut, not a crossfade. The one player cannot overlap with itself.
• Like any slide, moving it to the background sets its Slide volume to 0 the first time; after that it gets back the volume you last gave it there.
• Repeat on a streaming YouTube jumps back to where it started, just before the end. There is no overlap, so Loop crossfade does not apply. A downloaded one repeats like any video.
• When you take it off the foreground, its sound fades out with the picture, over the presentation’s Fade out time (Presentation settings).
• YouTube’s own controls stay off the stage — no title bar, progress bar, or suggested videos at the end or on pause. Use LayerCue’s controls under the preview.

While it is on an output screen

When a monitor that shows the YouTube’s layer has its output window open, a streaming YouTube is not shown in the preview inside the main window. The player itself has moved to that output screen — it moves rather than reloads, so the video carries on without a break. In its place is a translucent cover reading YouTube is playing on the output screen. If the YouTube sits in a video box, a red frame marks the box’s place on each preview whose monitor shows it. When no output window shows it — the monitors are off, or it goes to a virtual screen — the YouTube plays right there in the preview.

The cover holds the controls you need for it:

Bring to preview	Moves the player itself into this preview, so you can watch it here. While it is in the preview, the output screens don’t show it — as its tooltip says, Leaves the output screens until you send it back. Send back to output, at the top left of the preview, returns it
Quality	What is going out right now, such as Quality 1080p. YouTube chooses it by itself. Press Auto beside it for the qualities this video has, and pick one
Chapters	Only if the video has chapters. Pick one by name from the list, or step with the previous and next buttons

Raise the quality just after it goes out

YouTube picks the quality to suit the size of the player, and the in-app preview is small. When the player moves to the output screen it keeps that choice. Pick a higher one under Quality right after it goes out. In Slide settings, a streaming YouTube tells you how high it can go, such as up to 2160p.

You can still work on another YouTube while one is out: load it into Slide settings, play it, set its in and out points. While a YouTube plays on the foreground, that preview stays silent, so the sound never doubles.

On several monitors

If more than one monitor shows the layer the YouTube is on, every one of them shows it. One of them has the real player, with the sound; each of the others gets a silent copy that keeps to its position and follows its captions, Scale and quality. Each copy loads the video on its own, so the internet carries it once per monitor. The cover above shows on one preview only — that of the monitor with the sound. More in Multi-Output.

Captions, dubbed audio and chapters

These come from YouTube, so Captions and Audio work while the slide plays as Streaming.

Captions

A YouTube slide has a Captions row in Slide settings. The button shows the language that is on, or Captions Off. Press it and pick. It changes at once — in the preview and on stage.

The choice is not saved with the slide. It applies to whichever YouTube is playing and stays until you change it. Each time LayerCue opens, captions start from Settings › Files & YouTube › Default captions — Off or English — so they do not reset between rehearsal and the event.

The list holds only the languages you register. Manage languages… at the bottom opens Caption languages:

• Type in the field at the top to filter. It matches the start of a language name or code
• Click a row to tick it, and again to untick it
• At first it holds this computer’s language and English
• Press OK when you are done

The list shows eight at most

Register more than eight and only the first eight appear under Captions.

How the captions look is the same for every YouTube. Set it in Settings › Files & YouTube, under YouTube:

Setting	What it does
Caption position	Bottom (to start with) or Top of the picture
Caption font	Any font on this computer. Default is Pretendard, same as text boxes.
Caption size	From 50% to 300%. Relative to YouTube’s default. 100% is default.

The captions keep a dark outline and no box behind them. A change shows at once — on stage, in the preview and on every monitor that shows the YouTube.

Audio (dubbed tracks)

Some videos carry dubs in other languages. An Audio row appears under Captions once the video starts playing. Pick a track there. Unlike captions, this one is saved with the slide.

Chapters

A video split into chapters shows ticks on the progress bar in Slide settings, with the current chapter’s name and two buttons above it:

• Next chapter goes to the start of the next one. It is greyed on the last chapter
• Previous chapter goes to the start of the chapter you are in. Press it again straight away to go back one more — so one press replays the chapter you are on

The chapter list is read from YouTube the first time you open that slide, so it can take a moment. After that LayerCue remembers it.

Speed, in and out points, volume

These work as they do for a video, and they are saved with the slide — see Slide settings.

Sound

A streaming YouTube follows the device you choose in the speaker box in the status bar. YouTube itself can only play through the computer’s default sound output, so while LayerCue is running it makes the device you choose the computer’s default as well, and puts the old default back when it quits. If you change the computer’s sound output yourself in the meantime, LayerCue leaves your choice alone. A downloaded one follows the speaker box like any video.

For some videos LayerCue cannot read the sound level directly. The meter then moves as an estimate, with dimmed bars; hover it and it says Can’t measure this YouTube video directly — showing an estimate (dimmed bars). More in Sound and the meter.

The YouTube tool

LayerCue downloads videos and reads chapters with yt-dlp, and converts with ffmpeg. Both come with the app.

YouTube changes often, and a link that worked weeks ago can fail on the day. The fix is usually a newer yt-dlp, not a newer LayerCue. You get it in Settings › Tools.

YouTube tool	The version in use (Not found if there is none). Check looks for a newer one. Update fetches the newest and installs it. Revert — shown once you have updated — goes back to the copy that came with LayerCue
Check the tool daily	On by default. It checks once a day and only tells you; it installs nothing until you press Update

When a newer version is out, a notice says so (yt-dlp … is available — Settings › Tools), and a small wrench chip appears in the status bar. Click the chip and Settings opens at Tools.

After Update or Revert, quit LayerCue and open it again, so that downloads use the tool you just chose.

When it does not work

What you see	What to do
Download is greyed out	The YouTube tool was not found. In Settings › Tools, if YouTube tool reads Not found, press Update, then quit and reopen LayerCue
YouTube download failed — Could not download — check the link and your internet connection	Check the internet first. If that is fine, Settings › Tools › Check, then Update
YouTube download failed — Could not convert — check ffmpeg	Set Convert to H.264 to Never and download again
A link that played yesterday fails today	Update the YouTube tool. If the new version causes trouble, Revert
Text can’t go over full-screen YouTube streaming in the editor	Press Make it a video box in the editor’s Background row, and text and shapes can go on the slide. Or download it and switch to Downloaded. What you put on it before is only hidden, not deleted — it comes back
No gear for Crop & fit on the picture	Crop needs the Downloaded file
Two YouTube videos will not play together	Only one streaming YouTube fits on stage. Download one of them

Before the event

1. Download every video that must play, and switch it to Downloaded
2. If something has to stream, check the internet where you will be
3. The day before, press Check in Settings › Tools — not an hour before

YouTube features are not guaranteed

Everything on this page leans on what YouTube provides. When YouTube changes how it works, a feature can change or stop without notice, and we cannot promise to bring it back. If something that worked yesterday does not today, update the YouTube tool and try again a little later.

If a video absolutely has to play, have a downloaded copy or a local file ready.

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Something not covered here? See When something goes wrong or write to support@layercue.com.