How do we watch a video together?

Open a room or start a one-to-one chat, paste a link, and press play. Everyone in the chat is asked whether they want to load it, and whoever says yes watches it at the same moment as everyone else. Someone who joins partway through lands at the point the room has already reached, rather than at the beginning. There is nothing to install and no account to create.

Which services stay in sync?

It depends what each service allows. YouTube, Vimeo and SoundCloud keep the whole room on the same moment. Some others follow along more loosely, catching up when the host moves. A few, including Spotify, OK.ru, Mixcloud and TED, play separately for each person, so you press play yourselves. The room tells you which of these applies before you start.

Do I need an account or an extension?

Neither. It runs in an ordinary browser tab on a laptop, a tablet or a phone. There is no extension to install, no app store, and no account unless you want one.

Does the video site know who I am watching with?

Your browser does not contact the video site at all until you agree to load the player. If you decline, nothing is sent. If you agree, you are loading that site's own player from that point on, so their terms and cookies apply exactly as they would if you had opened them in another tab. Lumi itself carries no advertising and no third-party trackers, and never stores what was said in a room.

Can under-18s watch videos together?

No. Shared video and music are an adult feature. Under-18 users are matched only with other under-18 users, and shared players are not available in teen rooms.

Watch together · Free · 18+

The living room, when you cannot be in the same one

Before every screen was a broadcast, watching something with people just meant being in a room with them. Nobody performing. Nobody counting hearts. Whoever was on the sofa, and whatever was on. Lumi is that room, for people who cannot be in the same one.

Paste a link, press play, and everyone is on the same moment of the same thing while you talk over it. Free, in a browser tab, with no account and no adverts.

Who ends up using this

Somebody serving away from home Twenty minutes, a phone, and a bad connection is enough. There is nothing to install, no account to set up at the other end, and no app store to argue with.

The half of a couple who moved for university A film on a Tuesday costs nothing and needs no planning. It is the ordinary evenings that are hard to keep, not the big occasions.

A family spread across time zones One of you is having breakfast and one of you is having dinner. Watching the same thing at the same time is one of the few things that still works across that gap.

Friends who used to live nearer Nobody has to be interesting. That is rather the point of a room where something else is playing.

Anyone on the wrong shift Nights, or a rota nobody else is on. Being awake at the wrong hour is its own kind of distance, and it does not need a plane ticket to fix.

Someone who cannot easily get out Illness, recovery, a disability, or caring for somebody who cannot be left. The evening still happens. It just happens where you are.

Nobody is keeping score

On a live stream there is a performer and an audience. The performer is working: asking for hearts, reading names out, keeping the numbers up.

Lumi can put one person in front of a room. A room can invite a stranger in as a guest for ten minutes, and adults can watch something together with whoever turns up. What is missing is the scoreboard: no viewer count, no gifts, no ranking, and nothing that turns being looked at into a number that goes up.

A guest is someone the room wanted to talk to, not an act it booked. They can leave whenever they like, and nobody in the room gains anything by keeping them there. The room cannot even ask a guest to slip away for a private chat. Only the guest can ask the room.

The rest of the time, one person holds the controls so somebody can skip an ad, and that is the only way they differ from anyone else. You put something on, you talk over it, and when it finishes you go to bed.

Nothing follows you out of the room

Lumi carries no advertising and no third-party trackers, and does not sell anything about you, because it is funded by an optional membership rather than by your attention. Your IP address stays behind Lumi's own relay servers, so the people you are watching with never see it. What is said in a room is not stored and cannot be replayed by somebody who arrives later.

One honest limit: when you agree to load a video, you are loading that site's own player, and their terms and cookies apply from that point exactly as they would in any other tab. That is why Lumi asks first, and why nothing is requested from them at all until you say yes.

How it works

Open a room and share the link, or start a one-to-one chat.
Paste a video or a track. Everyone is asked whether to load it. Decline, and your browser never contacts the site.
Press play. Everyone who said yes is on the same moment.
Whoever is hosting holds the remote: pause, rewind the bit everyone missed, or skip an advert for the room. Turn up late and you land where everyone else already is.

What works with what

Keeping a room on the same second depends on what each service lets an embedded player do. Rather than promise the same everywhere, Lumi tells you in the room which of these you have got.

Service	What you get
YouTube, Vimeo, SoundCloud	The whole room on the same moment. Play, pause and skipping move everybody.
Twitch, Dailymotion, Bilibili, VK Video, RuTube, Internet Archive, Niconico	The room follows the host, catching up when they move it. A brief pause as it does.
Spotify, OK.ru, Mixcloud, TED	Everyone plays it themselves. Their players do not take instructions, so you press play together the old-fashioned way.

Questions

How do we watch a video together?: Open a room or start a one-to-one chat, paste a link, and press play. Everyone in the chat is asked whether they want to load it, and whoever says yes watches it at the same moment as everyone else. Someone who joins partway through lands at the point the room has already reached, rather than at the beginning. There is nothing to install and no account to create.
Which services stay in sync?: It depends what each service allows. YouTube, Vimeo and SoundCloud keep the whole room on the same moment. Some others follow along more loosely, catching up when the host moves. A few, including Spotify, OK.ru, Mixcloud and TED, play separately for each person, so you press play yourselves. The room tells you which of these applies before you start.
Do I need an account or an extension?: Neither. It runs in an ordinary browser tab on a laptop, a tablet or a phone. There is no extension to install, no app store, and no account unless you want one.
Does the video site know who I am watching with?: Your browser does not contact the video site at all until you agree to load the player. If you decline, nothing is sent. If you agree, you are loading that site's own player from that point on, so their terms and cookies apply exactly as they would if you had opened them in another tab. Lumi itself carries no advertising and no third-party trackers, and never stores what was said in a room.
Can under-18s watch videos together?: No. Shared video and music are an adult feature. Under-18 users are matched only with other under-18 users, and shared players are not available in teen rooms.

Put something on

Open a room, send the link to whoever you are missing, and watch something. It is free, and it takes about twenty seconds to start.

Open Lumi