Twitch is giving the community a new way to show support for streamers.
The site on Monday introduced Cheering, a feature that lets you financially support your favorite streamers and "celebrate the moments you love with the community, all right in chat," Twitch's Robin Fontaine explained. A Cheer is a chat message that uses Bits — evolving animated emotes that you can buy. You can use Bits emotes one by one, all at once, or however else you like.
"Using many at once shows more support and creates cooler emotes!" Twitch said.
To dole them out, just type "cheer" followed by a number anywhere in chat (i.e. cheer33, cheer225). In return, Twitch will recognize your support by giving you a Cheer Chat Badge for that channel.
To get started, you'll first need to buy some Bits; you can do so by clicking on the Bits icon that appears in the chat message window, just to the left of the emote button.
The feature is launching today in beta, and Twitch promised "more cool stuff for Cheering in the months to come." A full list of supported channels is in Twitch's blog post, but includes lirik, Summit1G, DansGaming, ProfessorBroman, KingGothalion, and more. According to Twitch, "eligible partnered broadcasters get a revenue share from Bits used to Cheer for them." Also see this Help Center article on Cheering for more details.
"We're so excited to bring this new experience to Twitch, and we hope you'll join us in support, celebration, and Cheering, together," Fontaine wrote.