This article will cover troubleshooting steps such as the "Waiting for OBS..." error message for Elgato Stream Deck 5.3 or later and OBS Studio Integration 2.0.
Please follow these steps if you are using Stream Deck 5.2 or earlier.
Please read this separate article if you are using OBS Studio 28 and have any difficulties with the latest Stream Deck Plugin.
The OBS Studio Plugin Is Not Installed
With the release of Stream Deck 5.3, the OBS Studio plugin is always placed in the default OBS Studio install location C:\Program Files\obs-studio. Below are various reasons why the plugin may not be installed, and the warning message appears.
If any of the following was done:
- If you changed the OBS Studio install location while installing OBS, the plugin might be missing.
- If you run OBS Studio in portable mode.
- If you have installed OBS Studio from Steam.
- If you have installed OBS Studio from the Microsoft store.
- If you installed 3rd party add-ons such as Streamelements SE.live, RPANStudio, or others, they may not be installed in the default location, and the plugin will be missing.
Check if the Stream Deck Plugin Missing from OBS Studio
No additional steps should be necessary if OBS Studio was installed before Stream Deck. However, if the plugin is not working or did not install correctly, please follow these steps.
To confirm, check that Elgato Stream Deck is visible in the Tools menu in OBS Studio.
If Elgato Stream Deck does not appear, follow these steps:
- Reinstall Stream Deck
- Ensure you're running OBS Studio 64-bit 27.2 or later (Elgato Stream Deck does not work with OBS Classic or OBS Studio 32-bit)
- If you downloaded OBS Studio after downloading Elgato Stream Deck, please reinstall Elgato Stream Deck from elgato.com/download, which automatically reinstalls the plugin files.
- Make sure OBS Studio is installed in the default file directory (C:\Program Files\obs-studio). The Elgato Stream Deck Plugin will not install otherwise.
Manual Stream Deck Plugin Installation - Windows
If OBS Studio is not installed in the default file directory, Stream Deck will be unable to install the necessary files. In this case, the files will need to be installed manually. A .zip archive program such as 7-Zip or WinRAR will be needed.
1) Close OBS Studio
2) Download the latest version of Stream Deck from elgato.com/download
3) Once Stream Deck is downloaded, using 7-Zip or WinRAR, right-click the installation file and open the archive. In the example below, 7-Zip was used.
4) Copy StreamDeckPlugin.dll & StreamDeckPlugin.pdb to your OBS Plugin Folder (C:\Program Files\obs-studio\obs-plugins\64bit).
Additional Support or Questions
For additional support or questions, please get in touch with us at elgato.com/help.