Posted by
jyaquinas
on March 30, 2022 ·
1 min read
TCP vs UDP
Both TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) vs. UDP (User/Universal Datagram Protocol) are transport layer protocols of the TCP/IP protocol stack. Both of them use the IP protocol.
TCP
Connection orientated protocol
Typically used when requires guaranteed message delivery (high reliability)
Has built it error recovery and retransmission
Sets up connection using a 3-way handshake
Send SYN (synchronize sequence number), informs the server that it wants to establish a connection
The server responds to the client by sending SYN-ACK (acknowledgment)
The client responds to the server with ACK. Once a reliable connection is established, a two-way data transfer is possible
UDP
Connectionless protocol (no handshake mechanism)
Data can be sent but cannot know whether it was successfully delivered on not (typically for apps that require fast data transfers)
Error handling must be done on the receiving side
Faster than TCP because there is no connection setup (less network traffic) and does not consume resources on receiving side (does not keep the connection open)