Guides

In two minutes

1. Pick a visual in the library and press Open in the player, or open the player straight away.
2. Choose what the visuals should listen to. Tempo needs no microphone: the visuals lock to a BPM you set or tap. Mic or line-in listens to the room or your mixer. Tab or system audio follows sound playing on your computer (Chrome or Edge on a desktop).
3. In tempo mode, set your BPM: open Controls (press C), go to Sound, and type it in, or press Tap (or Space) on the beat. It starts at 124.
4. Press F for full screen.

Free and Pro

Three visuals (Rose Window, Laser Nave and Kick Rings) and two palettes are free, in both styles, with a small credit in the corner. Everything else is part of Pro. Without Pro you can still try any Pro visual, palette or feature: it plays for 20 seconds, then the player goes back to what's free.

Visuals

Choose the Palette, the Style (Graphic flat, drawn in code, or Realistic 3D, built on rendered art) and the Visual itself. Search by name or mood, or filter by Favourites, Free or a mood. On each thumbnail, ☆ adds it to your favourites and ＋ adds it to your playlist. Some visuals come in one style only; the list shows the visuals in the style you've chosen.

Sound

Switch between Tempo, Mic / line-in and Tab / system, set or tap the BPM, and turn the Sensitivity down if the visuals react too much to a loud room (or up for a quiet one).

Look

Intensity dims or brightens everything. Strobe flashes on every beat or every few beats, and stays off until you switch it on. Transparent background (Pro) is for overlays on a stream. Resolution lowers the quality on slower computers.

Show

Autopilot and your Playlist (both Pro). See Playlists, sets and autopilot.

Stream

On-screen text (Pro) shows your DJ name and the track that's playing. Add to OBS copies a link for an OBS browser source. See Streaming with OBS and Showing the current track.

Pro

Buy Pro, or paste your license key to unlock it in this browser.

What it remembers

Your settings, favourites, playlist and license key are saved in this browser, so they're there next time. They aren't shared between browsers or computers.

The easy way: a browser source

1. Set the visual up the way you want it in the player: visual, style, palette and BPM.
2. Open Controls → Stream and press Copy OBS link. (On a visual's own page, the Copy OBS link button does the same for that visual.)
3. In OBS, add a source with + → Browser, paste the link as the URL, and set the width and height to 1920 × 1080.

The link opens the visual with no controls on screen. If you started the player in tempo mode, it needs no microphone. If you drift off the beat mid-set, right-click the source, choose Interact, and tap Space on the beat.

Without Pro, the link only carries free visuals and palettes: a Pro one is swapped for Rose Window and the Church of Rave palette.

Reacting to your actual audio

OBS can't share a browser tab, so to follow the music itself, run the player in its own Chrome or Edge window instead. Choose Tab or system audio and share your screen with Share system audio ticked, or choose Mic or line-in and select your audio interface. Press F for full screen (a second monitor helps) and add the window to OBS with Window Capture.

Using a mic inside a browser source

OBS blocks microphone access in browser sources by default. People on the OBS forums report that launching OBS with --enable-media-stream gets around it. On Windows, add it to the end of the Target field in the OBS shortcut. On a Mac, start OBS from Terminal with /Applications/OBS.app/Contents/MacOS/OBS --enable-media-stream. It isn't officially documented, so if nothing reacts, use tempo mode or Window Capture instead.

Overlays (Pro)

In Controls → Look, tick Transparent background before you copy the link. The dark parts turn see-through and only the light is left, on top of your camera or whatever's underneath. Graphic flat visuals on dark backgrounds work best, such as Laser Nave, Kick Rings and Neon Waves.

Getting it on the TV

The most reliable way is a laptop plugged into the TV or projector with HDMI. Open the player and press F for full screen. Smart TV browsers are often too slow for the visuals. Casting a Chrome tab to a Chromecast works, but adds a little delay.

Making it react to the room

Choose Mic or line-in. A laptop's built-in microphone is usually enough if it's in the same room as the speakers; turn the Sensitivity down (Controls → Sound) if the visuals are going wild. If you're playing from a mixer, a cable into an audio interface gives the cleanest signal. If it's too quiet to hear, use tempo mode and tap along. When the music stops, the visuals dim to a soft glow and wake up again when it comes back.

Leaving it running

With Pro, play a set, your playlist or autopilot and the player changes visual by itself (see Playlists, sets and autopilot). While the player is open it asks your device to keep the screen awake, which works in Chrome, Edge and Safari. Plug the laptop in, because the visuals use the graphics card.

Projectors

Projectors look best in a dark room. If the image looks washed out, lower the Intensity slider (Controls → Look) so the darks stay dark.

Autopilot

In Controls → Show, choose Next visual every 8 bars, or every 16 or 32. Under Cycle through, pick what it moves through: Everything I can use (the whole library in the current style), one of the sets, or My playlist. Autopilot can also change the palette every 4, 8, 16 or 32 bars.

Sets

Sets are ready-made running orders: Warm-up, Peak time, House party, After hours and The journey. Each has its own order for Graphic flat and for Realistic 3D, and plays the one for your style; The journey is Realistic 3D only, so it switches the player to that style. Press Play set on the library page, or choose one under Cycle through. A set moves to the next visual every 16 bars unless you pick another timing.

Your playlist

1. Add up to 10 visuals, in either style: press ＋ on a thumbnail in Controls → Visuals, or in Controls → Show pick one and press Add, or press Add what's on screen.
2. In the list, ↑ moves a visual up, ✕ removes it and ▶ shows it now.
3. Press Play my playlist. It plays in order on the autopilot timing, every 16 bars unless you choose another.

The playlist is saved in this browser, and the OBS link carries it, so a browser source plays the same running order.

Spotify, YouTube, YouTube Music, SoundCloud or Bandcamp: use Last.fm

1. Make a free account at last.fm.
2. For Spotify: in your Last.fm settings, open Applications and connect Spotify. For YouTube, YouTube Music, SoundCloud or Bandcamp, install the free Web Scrobbler browser extension and sign it in to Last.fm.
3. In the player, open Controls → Stream, choose Last.fm under Now playing, and type your username.

The player checks every twelve seconds, so the track updates soon after it changes. This is the only automatic option that also works inside an OBS browser source, because the OBS link carries your username.

Setting it up

1. Go to developer.spotify.com/dashboard, log in, and press Create app. Call it anything.
2. Under Redirect URIs, paste the address shown in the player under Controls → Stream, after you choose Spotify under Now playing. On this site it's https://churchofrave.com/claude/visualizer.html.
3. Tick Web API, agree to the terms and save.
4. Copy the app's Client ID, paste it into the player and press Connect Spotify.

This works when the player runs in a normal browser window. It can't sign in inside an OBS browser source, so for OBS use Last.fm instead.

Using a helper app

The free, open-source What's Now Playing app reads Serato, Traktor, VirtualDJ and Rekordbox, and can write the current track to a text file. Set it up to do that, then in Controls → Stream choose File under Now playing and press Choose file.

VirtualDJ on its own

VirtualDJ keeps a history playlist for each session in its History folder. Choose that file and leave The newest track is on the last line ticked.

Limits

Watching a file needs Chrome or Edge on a desktop computer, and it can't run inside an OBS browser source. On a stream, you can show the track with OBS's own Text source reading the same file, on top of the visuals.

If it stutters

The visuals run on your graphics card, and the Realistic 3D ones ask more of it. On Auto resolution the player lowers the quality by itself if frames start dropping. You can also choose Three quarters or Half under Controls → Look → Resolution, switch to the Graphic flat style, close other heavy tabs, and plug in your laptop.

Which browsers work?

Recent Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari on a computer. Following tab or system audio, and watching a now-playing file, need Chrome or Edge on a desktop.

Do they work on phones and tablets?

They can play the visuals, but phones and tablets run hot and slow down. For a show, use a laptop or desktop.

Does it record my audio?

No. The sound is analysed on your own device as it plays, and never recorded or uploaded. See Privacy.

Do I need to install anything?

No. It all runs in the browser. You need an internet connection to load the site, and for Last.fm, Spotify or checking a license key.

The visuals don't react to the music

In tempo mode they follow the BPM, not the sound, so set or tap the right tempo. With a microphone, check the browser is allowed to use it (the icon in the address bar), pick the right input when it asks, and turn up the Sensitivity. With tab audio, make sure Share audio was ticked when you shared.