What Is Real-Time Transport Protocol (RTP)?

Overview

RTP, short for Real-Time Transport Protocol, is a network protocol transmitting real-time data, like audio and video, from unicast or multicast network services. It is designed to provide end-to-end transport capabilities for applications that deliver real-time data.

RTP provides services with the RTCP(RTP Control Protocol), including sequence numbering, time-stamping, payload type identification, and delivery monitoring.

Real-time multimedia streaming applications need to deliver information promptly. Some packet loss can often be tolerated to achieve this goal.

RTP sessions typically start between communication equivalents using the signaling protocol. Each multimedia stream establishes an RTP session. Audio and video streams can use separate RTP sessions to enable the receiver to receive components selectively for a particular stream.

History

• RTP is developed by four IETF(Internet Engineering Task Force) members: S. Casner, V. Jacobson, H. Schulzrinne, and R. Frederick.
• RTP was first published in 1996, which was known as RFC 1889.
• It was then released in 2003 with the name of RFC 3550, which superseded RFC 1889.

Application

Functional multimedia applications require additional protocols and standards that are used in conjunction with RTP.

RTP is mainly utilized in communication and entertainment systems like telephony and video teleconference applications. Though (Transmission Control Protocol) TCP is standardized for RTP use, it is not typically used in RTP applications as TCP prefers reliability to timeliness.

RTP is used for communication and entertainment systems involving streaming media. And it runs over UDP(User Datagram Protocol).

Although TCP (Transport Control Protocol) is standardized for RTP, it is not typically used in RTP applications because TCP prefers reliability to timeliness.

• RTP is primarily useful for media mixing, sequencing and time-stamping.
• It cooperates with VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol).
• RTP is useful in Video Teleconferencing over the Internet.
• It works well in Internet Audio and video streaming.

RTP VS. UDP

• They are both used for real-time streaming.
• They both support broadcasting and multicasting.
• RTP refers to Real-time Transport Protocol, while UDP stands for the User Datagram Protocol.
• RTP is simpler, faster, and more efficient than UDP.
• RTP is stateless, but UDP is a connection-less protocol.
• RTP can tolerate packet loss, but UDP can not.

Final Words!

After reading this post, you may better understand RTP, including its definition, history, applications, and the differences between RTP and UDP.