# cowtoolz/webcamize

Use (almost) any camera as a webcam

Repository: https://github.com/cowtoolz/webcamize
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/webcamize
Language: C
License: BSD-2-Clause
License Family: permissive
Topics: camera, video, webcam, linux
Last push: 2026-05-25T19:55:50+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 68/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 84, release rhythm 40, longevity 80
- inputs: {"age_days": 1122, "days_push": 100, "days_rel": 449, "gap_med": 11, "n_releases_24m": 2}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1743, forks 40 (observed 2026-08-28T04:05:30.329392+00:00)

## What it is
Webcamize is a command-line tool that turns almost any modern camera—DSLRs, mirrorless cameras, camcorders, point-and-shoots, and some smartphones—into a webcam on Linux. It also fixes many webcams that don't work out of the box, with macOS and Windows support in progress.

## Use cases
- use my dslr as a webcam on linux
- make my mirrorless camera work as a webcam
- get a webcam that doesn't work on linux running
- use a camcorder as a webcam for video calls
- turn a point-and-shoot camera into a webcam
- use my phone camera as a webcam on linux

## When to choose
- you want to use a DSLR, mirrorless, or camcorder as a webcam on Linux
- your webcam isn't recognized out of the box on Linux
- you want a simple one-command setup with no complex configuration

## When to avoid
- you need full macOS or Windows support today (still in progress)
- you need a GUI-based webcam configuration tool
- your camera is not on the supported devices list

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: active
- function: video-processing, cli, developer-tools
- domain: media, operating-systems, hardware, cross-platform
- platform: cli, cross-platform
- tags: webcam, dslr, camera, v4l2, video-capture, linux

## Member repositories
- cowtoolz/webcamize (main) score 68

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:30.329392+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T03:29:32.569184+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/cowtoolz/webcamize (fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:30.329392+00:00, sha 76ebd7f30b54)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.