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networking

TCP vs UDP

TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) provides reliable, ordered delivery with connection establishment and flow control. UDP (User Datagram Protocol) is a lightweight, connectionless protocol that trades reliability for speed. Choosing between them depends on whether your application needs guaranteed delivery or low latency.

Use Cases

  • •Using TCP for web browsing, email, and file transfers where every byte matters
  • •Using UDP for live video streaming, online gaming, and VoIP where speed beats perfection
  • •Implementing custom protocols that need to balance reliability with performance
  • •Understanding why DNS uses UDP for queries but TCP for zone transfers

Visualization

SETUPClientTCPServerTCPClientUDPServerUDP
Speed:1x
TCP vs UDP — TCP is reliable with handshakes; UDP is fast but unreliableStep 1 / 8

Implementation

Output

Click "Run Code" to see output...