TikTok Live Recorder: Real Problems I Hit and How I Fixed Them

Why I'm writing this

Found TikTok-Live-Recorder, thought it was perfect. Set it up, worked great for a week. Then problems started showing up.

Recordings wouldn't start even though users were live. Sometimes recordings wouldn't stop until I manually killed the process. Video quality looked terrible sometimes. Checked GitHub issues - turns out these are common problems lots of people hit.

Spent way too much time figuring out fixes. Documenting what actually worked for me, not theoretical solutions. If you're hitting the same walls, maybe this saves you some time.

Problem #1: Recordings won't start

What actually worked for me

# 1. First, verify username format exactly matches TikTok URL
# @username vs username - both should work but sometimes doesn't

# 2. Check if TikTok changed their Webcast API
# Tool uses tiktok.live webcast endpoint
# If TikTok changes it, tool breaks until update

# 3. Try forcing record even if status check fails
python recorder.py --user @username --force-record

# 4. Enable debug logging to see what's happening
# In config.ini:
enable_debug_log = true

# Then check logs:
tail -f recorder.log

# Look for errors like:
# ERROR: Failed to get live info
# ERROR: No URL found

# Kill existing instances
pkill -f recorder.py

# Start fresh
source venv/bin/activate  # or venv\Scripts\activate on Windows
python recorder.py

Root cause (I think)

TikTok's CDN returns different stream URLs based on your location or IP. Sometimes the URL returned is invalid or expired. Tool tries to start recording with bad URL, fails silently.

My workaround: Run on a VPS in different region than my local machine. More consistent stream URLs that way.

Problem #2: Recordings won't stop

What I did

# 1. Set recording timeout in config.ini
# Even if stream appears live, stop recording after X minutes
recording_timeout = 3600  # 1 hour max

# 2. Add restart-on-change option
# Restart recording if stream parameters change
restart_on_change = true

# 3. Monitor disk space during recording
# Run separate script:
while true; do
  df -h | grep recordings
  sleep 300  # check every 5 min
done

Cron job to kill hung recordings

#!/bin/bash
# kill-hung-recordings.sh

# Find recordings older than 2 hours (probably hung)
find /path/to/recordings -name "*.mp4" -mmin +120 -exec rm {} \;

# Also kill the process if recording file hasn't grown in 10 min
python recorder.py &
RECORDER_PID=$!

while true; do
  # Find largest recording file
  LATEST_FILE=$(ls -t /path/to/recordings/*.mp4 | head -1)

  # Check size, wait 10 min, check again
  SIZE1=$(stat -f%z "$LATEST_FILE" 2>/dev/null || echo 0)
  sleep 600
  SIZE2=$(stat -f%z "$LATEST_FILE" 2>/dev/null || echo 0)

  # If same size, process is probably hung
  if [ "$SIZE1" -eq "$SIZE2" ]; then
    kill $RECORDER_PID
    break
  fi

  sleep 60
done

Problem #3: Status checking just stops

How I diagnosed it

# 1. Enable debug logging
enable_debug_log = true

# 2. Run in foreground to see output
python recorder.py --no-daemon

# Saw this in logs:
# INFO: Checking users...
# DEBUG: API request failed: 429 Too Many Requests
# INFO: Sleeping 60 seconds...
# But then it never woke up from sleep

# In config.ini, increase check interval
check_interval = 300  # 5 minutes between checks instead of 60 seconds

# Also add retry logic:
max_retries = 3
retry_delay = 30

Monitoring script

#!/bin/bash
# monitor.sh - Watch if recorder is actually working

while true; do
  LAST_CHECK=$(stat -f%m /path/to/recordings/*.mp4 2>/dev/null | head -1 | xargs -I{} date -r {} +"%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
  NOW=$(date +"%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")

  TIME_DIFF=$(( $(date -j -f "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S" "$NOW" -f "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S" "$LAST_CHECK") +%s ))

  # If no file modified in 30 minutes, restart
  if [ $TIME_DIFF -gt 1800 ]; then
    echo "$(date): No recent activity, restarting..."
    pkill -f recorder.py
    sleep 10
    cd /path/to/TikTok-Live-Recorder
    python recorder.py &
  fi

  sleep 600  # check every 10 minutes
done

Problem #4: Video quality looks terrible

What I tried that didn't work

# Setting video_quality in config.ini
# This didn't actually fix it:
video_quality = 1080p

# Turns out this is just a preference, not guaranteed

What actually helped

# Leave empty to request original quality
video_quality =

# Not 1080p, not source, just empty
# This lets TikTok send whatever quality it wants

Region hack

# TikTok serves different quality based on region
# Ran recorder through VPN to different countries

# Using proxy in config.ini
[Connection]
proxy = socks5://127.0.0.1:1080

# Or set environment variable
export HTTP_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:1080
export HTTPS_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:1080
python recorder.py

YMMV - sometimes helped, sometimes didn't. Depends on TikTok's CDN at that moment.

Problem #5: Can't record more than a few streams at once

How I handled it

# 1. Limit concurrent recordings
# In config.ini:
max_concurrent_recordings = 5

# 2. Prioritize important users
# Created priority list:
important_users = @creator1, @creator2, @creator3

# Regular users:
regular_users = @creator4, @creator5

# Run separate instances:
# Instance 1 - VIP users (always recording)
python recorder.py --config config-priority.ini

# Instance 2 - Regular users (lower priority)
python recorder.py --config config-regular.ini

Resource monitoring

# Check if system can handle more streams
# While recording, run:
nvidia-smi  # if using GPU acceleration
htop  # see CPU and RAM usage
iotop  # see disk I/O

# For me, limit was disk I/O
# Multiple streams writing to same disk = bottleneck

# Solution: Record to different disks
# config-1.ini:
download_folder = /mnt/disk1/recordings

# config-2.ini:
download_folder = /mnt/disk2/recordings

Getting notifications when streams start

Simple notification script

#!/bin/bash
# notify.sh - Send notification when new recording starts

RECORDINGS_DIR="/path/to/recordings"
TELEGRAM_TOKEN="your-bot-token"
CHAT_ID="your-chat-id"

# Get count of mp4 files
PREVIOUS_COUNT=$(find "$RECORDINGS_DIR" -name "*.mp4" | wc -l)

while true; do
  sleep 60  # check every minute

  CURRENT_COUNT=$(find "$RECORDINGS_DIR" -name "*.mp4" | wc -l)

  if [ $CURRENT_COUNT -gt $PREVIOUS_COUNT ]; then
    NEW_FILES=$((CURRENT_COUNT - PREVIOUS_COUNT))

    # Get latest file
    LATEST_FILE=$(ls -t "$RECORDINGS_DIR"/*.mp4 | head -1)
    FILENAME=$(basename "$LATEST_FILE")

    # Send to Telegram
    curl -s -X POST \
      "https://api.telegram.org/bot$TELEGRAM_TOKEN/sendMessage" \
      -d chat_id="$CHAT_ID" \
      -d text="🔴 New TikTok recording: $FILENAME"

    PREVIOUS_COUNT=$CURRENT_COUNT
  fi
done

Discord webhook alternative

#!/bin/bash
# discord-notify.sh

WEBHOOK_URL="your-discord-webhook-url"

send_discord_notification() {
  local username=$1
  local status=$2

  curl -X POST "$WEBHOOK_URL" \
    -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
    -d "{
      \"content\": \"**TikTok Live Alert**\n\n**User**: @$username\n**Status**: $status\",
      \"username\": \"TikTok Recorder\"
    }"
}

# Call when recording starts
send_discord_notification "creator1" "Started recording"

Maintenance tips that matter

Keep it updated

# Check for updates weekly
cd TikTok-Live-Recorder
git fetch origin
git log HEAD..origin/main --oneline

# If updates available:
git pull origin/main
pip install -r requirements.txt --upgrade

# I set reminder in calendar for every Monday

Clean old recordings automatically

#!/bin/bash
# cleanup.sh - Delete recordings older than 30 days

RECORDINGS_DIR="/path/to/recordings"
KEEP_DAYS=30

find "$RECORDINGS_DIR" -name "*.mp4" -mtime +$KEEP_DAYS -delete

# Add to crontab:
# 0 2 * * * /path/to/cleanup.sh
# Runs daily at 2 AM

Backup important stuff

#!/bin/bash
# backup.sh - Copy important recordings to backup drive

SOURCE="/path/to/recordings"
DESTINATION="/mnt/backup/tiktok"

# Use rsync to copy only new files
rsync -av --progress "$SOURCE/" "$DESTINATION/"

# I run this weekly
# Saved me when main drive died

Reality check

Not trying to say TikTok-Live-Recorder is perfect. It breaks. TikTok changes stuff and tool breaks. Developer fixes it when they can.

But compared to manually screen recording? It's way better. Set and forget mostly works. Issues pop up but there are usually workarounds.

If you're thinking about using it, my advice: start small. Monitor 2-3 users max at first. Get that working reliably before adding more. Test thoroughly before relying on it.

And join the GitHub discussions. That's where real troubleshooting happens - people posting actual problems and solutions that worked for them. Not theoretical perfect-world scenarios.