# ThinLinc webcam prototype **URL:** \ **Category:** Blog\ **Tags:** webcam, thinlinc\ **Created:** [5 March 2026 16:06 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938 "2026-03-05T16:06:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CendioOssman](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/cendioossman/32/385_2.png) [@CendioOssman](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/CendioOssman)\ **Post date:** [5 March 2026 16:06 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/1 "2026-03-05T16:06:54Z")
I’m happy to share a bit of what’s going on behind the scenes here at Cendio. We now have a first working prototype of webcam support in ThinLinc: ![](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/uploads/thinlinc/original/2X/e/ed7e2fcf20fc759c23c7c7a7f279ea11d65c9827.jpeg) We know that this is a feature that has been requested by many users. E.g. in the thread [How To: Get USB cameras working through thinlinc](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/how-to-get-usb-cameras-working-through-thinlinc/134), or [Video forwarding](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/video-forwarding/903). We’ve also [tracked this in our bugzilla](https://bugzilla.cendio.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2068) for a long time. This project is done in collaboration with one of our ThinLinc customers, who are co-financing this development with Cendio. If everything goes well, this will be included in ThinLinc 4.22.0 at the end of this year. At that point, it will work as smoothly as all other features in ThinLinc, and on all platforms. Users will simply need to click a box in the client to share their camera. Our goal is to have no need for manual configuration on the server, no extra kernel modules, or any such magic that might disrupt stability or compatibility. Stay tuned as we’ll share more updates on how this project progresses. ---
**Author:** ![j.maus](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/j.maus/32/40_2.png) [@j.maus](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/j.maus)\ **Post date:** [6 March 2026 08:17 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/2 "2026-03-06T08:17:08Z")
Hi Pierre, this is really great news since there are certainly many ThinLinc users out there patiently waiting for such a general solution or even have worked on some own workarounds here. In fact, here we have implemented a kinda hybrid solution in our own [thinRoot OS](https://github.com/jens-maus/thinRoot) driven Thinclient environment. Our users can (if they require some webcam/video) quickly disconnect their session and re-connect via ThinLinc in windowed mode and then use the Linux environment in the thinRoot ThinClient OS to start common video conferencing connections via a local chrome oder zoom client in the ThinClient and then interact (e.g. screen share) like this with with their ThinLinc session. But it would of course be better to have a native webcam support in ThinLinc to route the video signal from a webcam transparently into the ThinLinc session. However, can you perhaps already share some more technical details on the actual solution you are about to implement (h264 streaming or direct ip-based USB forwarding?) since I fear that in case 20-30 users would start a webcam session in their ThinLinc session, the bandwith of the underlying server would quickly be exhausted if the video signal forwarding would just transparently forward the signal to the server. So some more technical details in advance would be great! Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![wilsj](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/wilsj/32/554_2.png) [@wilsj](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/wilsj)\ **Post date:** [6 March 2026 09:46 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/3 "2026-03-06T09:46:39Z")
Hi @j.maus, Thank you for your response! Sending the raw, uncompressed, USB data stream has been out of the question since day one of this project based on those exact bandwidth concerns you raise. As far as I’m aware, we are yet to decide on a codec to use for the network transport. Regardless, we are well aware of the fact that a handful of uncompressed camera streams will easily saturate a 1GbE NIC and will have that solved before release 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![CendioOssman](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/cendioossman/32/385_2.png) [@CendioOssman](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/CendioOssman)\ **Post date:** [23 June 2026 13:53 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/4 "2026-06-23T13:53:58Z")
Things are progressing nicely here in turning the prototype in to something production ready. The basic infrastructure for the ThinLinc server is in place, as is support for Linux clients. We are currently finishing up support for Windows clients, followed by getting macOS up and running as well. As a preview for what it will look for users, it will simply be this new entry in the client options: ![image](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/uploads/thinlinc/original/2X/d/dfb7f9c1a0ba71c71c5ae8edb5a7a78d71d96387.png) ---
**Author:** ![Harj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Harj](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/Harj)\ **Post date:** [13 July 2026 00:31 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/5 "2026-07-13T00:31:50Z")
Looking forward to seeing this in the 4.22 release. ---
**Author:** ![j.maus](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/j.maus/32/40_2.png) [@j.maus](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/j.maus)\ **Post date:** [23 September 2026 13:54 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/6 "2026-09-23T13:54:20Z")
@CendioOssman > [@CendioOssman](#): > > Things are progressing nicely here in turning the prototype in to something production ready. The basic infrastructure for the ThinLinc server is in place, as is support for Linux clients. We are currently finishing up support for Windows clients, followed by getting macOS up and running as well. Now that we are slowly approaching ThinLinc 4.22.0, I wonder if there might be any possibility to have some early access to a technology preview of ThinLinc 4.22.0 including this webcam/video possibility? This would allow us to test it early and perhaps provide some early feedback on it in case there might be some things still requiring some tuning. IMHO this would be a good opportunity, especially for long term customers 😉 ---
**Author:** ![CendioOssman](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/cendioossman/32/385_2.png) [@CendioOssman](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/CendioOssman)\ **Post date:** [24 September 2026 07:09 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/7 "2026-09-24T07:09:50Z")
I’m afraid it doesn’t look like this will be included in the ThinLinc 4.22.0 release. Although the new component is progressing nicely, there is more work required to get it fully integrated in to the ThinLinc server and client. We want to make sure it works reliably on every system, and without any manual configuration required. Other items are ahead of it in the planning, and presently it doesn’t look like we’ll be able to finish those and the webcam integration before it is time for the winter release. That does mean that it is likely the first thing we’ll be doing next year, though. ---
**Author:** ![j.maus](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/community.thinlinc.com/j.maus/32/40_2.png) [@j.maus](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/j.maus)\ **Post date:** [24 September 2026 11:42 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/8 "2026-09-24T11:42:42Z")
Thank you for the update @CendioOssman. Looking forwarding to seeing this finally implemented in the ThinLinc infrastructure since I was almost in looking how this could be implemented alternatively using our ThinRoot environment 😉 Besides, I still think it would be greatly beneficial if you could consider releasing an early technology preview even thought there might still be some own tuning required. This could also give you some early feedback on what might still be required or not completely working with different user environments in mind. So please, consider this! ---
**Author:** ![Harj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Harj](https://community.thinlinc.com/u/Harj)\ **Post date:** [29 September 2026 21:26 UTC](https://community.thinlinc.com/t/thinlinc-webcam-prototype/1938/9 "2026-09-29T21:26:34Z")
Agreed. A beta release for the community to test various webcams and provide feedback before the full release.