Moonshine lets you stream games from your PC to any device running Moonlight, with keyboard, mouse, and controller inputs sent back to the host for remote play. Each stream runs in its own isolated compositor, separate from your desktop environment, so the host PC remains usable for other tasks. No monitor is required — it works on headless servers without an HDMI dummy plug.

Hardware video encoding supports H.264, H.265, and AV1 via GPU. AV1 encoding is experimental on NVIDIA GPUs (frame size grows over time; fixed in driver 595.44.3.0). Features include true 10-bit HDR streaming, full input support (mouse, keyboard, gamepad with motion, touchpad, haptics), and low-latency Opus audio (stereo, 5.1, 7.1).

Requirements: Linux only (tested on Arch), systemd, GPU with Vulkan video encoding (NVIDIA RTX, AMD RDNA2+, Intel Arc), and Moonlight v6.0.0+. Install via AUR on Arch. Configuration uses config.toml; pair clients via PIN at http://localhost:47989/pin. Application scanners auto-detect Steam games and .desktop apps.

Compared to Sunshine, Moonshine is Linux-only but isolates each session, keeping the host usable and working without an active desktop. Security: not for public networks; use a VPN (Tailscale, WireGuard, ZeroTier) for internet streaming.