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TCP vs UDP Simulator

Interactive visualization showing the differences between TCP's reliable connection-oriented protocol and UDP's fast connectionless approach. See the 3-way handshake, packet loss, and retransmissions in action.

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Protocol Simulator

Visualize the 3-Way Handshake and Reliability mechanisms.

TCP Concept: Idle

Sent
0
Received
0
Loss Rate
0%
Retries
0Reliability Cost
DISCONNECTED
CLIENT
(Sender)
SERVER
(Receiver)

Ready to simulate

Simulation Control

Traffic Speed50%

Network Conditions

Packet Loss
0%
Jitter (Instability)
0%
SYSTEM LOGLIVE
Waiting for traffic...

Experiment by increasing "Packet Loss" to see how TCP retries vs UDP just loses data.

Understanding TCP vs UDP

TCP (Transmission Control Protocol)

  • Connection-oriented with 3-way handshake
  • Guaranteed delivery and ordering
  • Automatic retransmission of lost packets
  • Flow control and congestion management
  • Higher overhead but reliable
  • Best for: HTTP, FTP, email, file transfers

UDP (User Datagram Protocol)

  • Connectionless. No handshake required.
  • No delivery or ordering guarantees
  • No retransmission. Fire and forget.
  • Minimal overhead, very fast
  • Lower latency, higher throughput
  • Best for: Streaming, gaming, VoIP, DNS

When to use each protocol

  • Use TCP when data integrity is critical (banking, file downloads, web pages).
  • Use UDP when speed matters more than reliability (live video, multiplayer games).
  • Some apps use both: DNS queries over UDP, zone transfers over TCP.
  • Modern protocols like QUIC combine benefits of both (HTTP/3).

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