How to Set up and Customize Twitch Channel Points

There are so many ways to keep your Twitch viewers engaged during your live stream. One of our favorite ways is by using channel points—a built-in, reward-based point system that allows your audience to receive points for completing specific actions. In addition to earning points, your most loyal viewers can redeem them for prizes. In this blog post we’ll show you how to set up and customize your Twitch channel points as well as how to create Community Challenges.

Note: The option to set Twitch Channel points is currently only available to Twitch Partners and Affiliates. To learn more, read our guide about how to become a Twitch Affiliate or the differences between Twitch Partners and Affiliates. 

Summary:

1. What are Twitch channel points? Twitch Channel Points are a built-in, reward-based point system that allows your audience to receive points for completing specific actions.  
2. How to enable Twitch channel points: From the Viewer Rewards section of your Twitch Creator Dashboard, you can enable or disable the channel points option at any time. 

How to customize Twitch channel points: Customizing your Twitch channel points starts with creating a name and uploading icons for your personalized points system. From there, you can customize the rewards given to individuals or for community challenges (where viewers can initiate collaborative rewards like a giveaway launch).

How to Enable Twitch Channel Points

Enabling Twitch Channel points is pretty straightforward. 

1. Head to your Twitch Creator Dashboard.
2. From the navigation panel of your Twitch dashboard, select Viewer Rewards, then Channel Points. 
3. Here, you can toggle the Enable Channel Points option on or off at any time.
   

How to Customize Twitch Channel Points 

1. Under the Customized Points Display tab (right under the Enable Channel Points option), select Edit to begin customizing your channel points. 
2. The first order of business is to name your points system. Try to think of something creative that relates to your channel and niche.
3. Next, upload the appropriate sized icons (28 x 28, 56 x 56 and 112 x 112 pixels, respectfully) for your points. 

Rewards & Community Challenges

Under the Manage Rewards and Community Challenges tab, you can create goals for your audience to work towards as a team (i.e.reaching a specific number of donated points to initiate a giveaway). You can also customize rewards given for individual redemptions.

To create a Community Challenge, complete the following steps:

1. Select Create a Community Challenge.
2. Select a name for your challenge (i.e., “Bigtime Giveaway” for a giveaway challenge).
3. Under Description, give your viewers details about what the challenge entails. Be as descriptive and enticing as possible.
4. Next, set a goal amount. Word of advice—set this amount at a reasonably high amount since it’s a team effort. 
5. Next, set the duration of the challenge, aka the number of days your community has to reach the goal. 
6. Customize your challenge icons by uploading the appropriate sizes in the designated fields. You can also set a unique background color for the icons if you desire.
7. Next, select Create to add the challenge to your dashboard.
8. Remember to press Start to launch the challenge. The create button doesn’t automatically start the challenge. 

Directly under the Create a Community Challenge option, you’ll find Custom Rewards. To customize channel points rewards, complete the following steps:

1. Select +Add new Custom Reward.
2. Choose a name for your reward. Make it something short, simple, and straight to the point (i.e., a Dance break). 
3. Next, write a brief description of what happens during your live stream when a viewer redeems points for this specific reward (i.e., streamer dancing for 30 seconds on camera). 
4. If you want to require a viewer to enter text to redeem, toggle on the option.
5. Next, set the cost of the reward.
6. Once you’ve determined the cost of your reward, set reward icons by dragging and dropping the images to the appropriate fields. 
7. Remember to also set countdowns and limits so your viewers can only redeem a set amount of times during one stream. Just imagine if your stream turns into you dancing for a majority of the time. 

As you can see, Twitch gives streamers a ton of control over how to engage and reward their biggest fans. What are some ways you’re planning to customize your channel points and rewards? Share your ideas with us on Twitter or Discord!