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Build infinitely scalable realtime applications.
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Empower your customers with realtime solutions.
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Provide trustworthy, HIPAA-compliant realtime apps.
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On this page
1. Topics
2. /
3. Protocols
4. /
5. gRPC vs. WebSocket: Key differences and which to use
15 min read•Last updatedUpdated May 10, 2023
GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET: KEY DIFFERENCES AND WHICH TO USE
This article explores the differences between two popular realtime web
communication technologies: gRPC and WebSocket. Both support bidirectional
full-duplex communication and allow the server to push messages to the client
without polling from the client side. However, beyond some similarities, gRPC
and WebSocket have plenty of differences, so the choice between them depends on
exactly what you need for your project.
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WHAT IS GRPC?
gRPC is an open source Remote Procedure Call (RPC) framework initially developed
at Google in 2016 with two goals in mind:
1. Create a high throughput alternative to HTTP JSON APIs
2. Additionally, enable bidirectional streaming, replacing the need for sockets
in some circumstances
To accomplish this, gRPC uses HTTP/2 as the transport protocol and Protobuf as
the wire format.
In addition to these functional goals, gRPC provides a productive developer
experience by offering a framework to predefine the procedures (functions) that
can be called remotely, and the structure of the data those procedures can
accept or return.
By default, gRPC uses Protocol Buffers (Protobuf) Interface Definition Language
(IDL) to define the schema. Here’s an example of what it looks like:
// The greeter service definition.
service Greeter {
// Sends a greeting
rpc SayHello (HelloRequest) returns (HelloReply) {}
}
// The request message containing the user's name.
message HelloRequest {
string name = 1;
}
// The response message containing the greetings
message HelloReply {
string message = 1;
}
It’s up to the server to implement this interface, then the client can call it
transparently over the network with only a small latency.
At this point you might be wondering, which client libraries does gRPC support?
All of them, pretty much! Here’s how it works.
After you define your interface like in the snippet above, Protobuf can generate
idiomatic client code (stubs) that can call the remote procedures in almost any
programming language.
This is a big draw for gRPC and Protobuf in general because it means programs
written in different languages can call each other’s procedures. For example, a
Go microservice can send logs to a Java microservice, or a Ruby server can
stream data to an Android or iOS client.
What about on the web where WebSockets reign supreme?
Unfortunately, it’s not the best news.
While gRPC does work in the browser with gRPC-web, request streaming (client
streaming) and bidirectional streaming are not supported due to their dependence
on HTTP/2.
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WHAT IS GRPC-WEB?
As you will recall from the introduction, gRPC relies on HTTP/2 under the hood.
Unfortunately, while modern web browsers do actually support HTTP/2, they don’t
give client library developers the fine-grain control they need to implement the
gRPC specification.
To work around this, gRPC-web requires a small proxy on the server to translate
the requests and responses from HTTP/2 to HTTP/1.
This is good for interoperability, but since the transport protocol is
downgraded from HTTP/1 to HTTP/2, we lose some features and benefits. Most
notably for our comparison with WebSockets, request streaming and bidirectional
streaming.
This makes gRPC-web inappropriate for many bidirectional use cases like speech
recognition or chat, at least for now.
gRPC-web plans to implement request streaming and, in turn, bidirectional
streaming using Web Transport by “2023+”. With that said, extending gRPC-web’s
streaming capabilities has been the subject of much debate among users since
2016, and it remains unclear when it will be fully available.
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GRPC STRENGTHS
Let’s recap some of the advantages of gRPC, plus some others we think you should
know about:
* Cross platform: Libraries are available in several languages, and the
Protobuf format allows them to interoperate smoothly (so you can easily use
clients and servers written in different languages).
* Multiple parallel requests: When used with HTTP/2, gRPC supports multiplexing
many requests on one connection, allowing for higher throughput.
* Bidirectional streaming: When used with HTTP/2, gRPC supports bidirectional
streaming, which sometimes replaces the need for sockets.
* Lightweight messages: Compared to JSON or XML, which is text-based, Protobuf
uses a compact binary format.
* Optional compression: Because messages are lightweight by nature, you might
not need compression, which can save valuable CPU resources on mobile and IoT
devices.
* High performance encoding: Protobuf is 5x faster than JSON at encoding
messages, which will be tangible in high throughput situations.
* Strongly typed message structure: By predefining the shape of messages with
Protobuf, developers are less likely to make errors like forgetting a
required field. As a bonus, defining schemas with Protobuf allows for
versioning.
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GRPC WEAKNESSES
For all the benefits gRPC affords, it’s not without its limitations. Here’s a
quick recap, as well as some other weaknesses you might want to be aware of:
* Limited browser support: This is the big one when comparing gRPC and
WebSockets. gRPC-web does not support request streaming, bidirectional
streaming, or multiplexing because of its reliance on HTTP/2.
* Difficult to debug: Protobuf messages aren’t human-readable compared to JSON
or XML. To decode a Protobuf message, you need the original schema to hand.
This can break tools like network traffic inspectors. For instance, Lyft ran
into this exact situation and had to build a new tool.
* Lack of maturity: Compared to WebSockets, which have 27K questions on
StackOverflow, gRPC currently has little over 6K. While gRPC has been adopted
by big companies we all know and respect like Lyft and Uber, it’s not too
widespread.
* Complexity: gRPC can be difficult to set up because it relies on HTTP/2 and
Protobuf. It might be too much for smaller apps, and may need extra work to
deploy well in a distributed system.
* Header weight: Although headers are compressed with HTTP/2 using HPACK, they
add a small overhead to each request compared to WebSockets.
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WHAT IS WEBSOCKET?
The WebSocket technology is a W3C standard that was introduced in 2008. A
WebSocket connection is initiated by the client using an HTTP/1.1 request that
gets "upgraded" by the server to a full-duplex, bidirectional communication
channel. This connection persists until it is closed explicitly by either the
client or the server, and, unlike HTTP, it imposes very little data transmission
overhead. WebSocket is in widespread use by many companies, including HubSpot,
Figma, and DAZN, to name just a few.
WebSocket can transmit both text (string) and binary data. The WebSocket
protocol allows you to specify a subprotocol during the initial HTTP/1.1
handshake that can be used on top of WebSockets (for example, MQTT).
Alternatively, you can define your own protocol on top of raw WebSockets if,
say, you need custom data semantics or extra features such as publish/subscribe
messaging.
Read more about how WebSockets work
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WEBSOCKET STRENGTHS
Here are some of the key strengths of WebSockets:
* Cross platform: There are numerous libraries and frameworks implementing the
WebSocket protocol across all programming languages and development
platforms.
* Built for the web: Browsers natively support the WebSocket API, which is an
advantage compared to gRPC.
* Minimal transmission overhead: Unlike earlier HTTP-based approaches (such as
long polling), the WebSocket protocol uses persistent connections rather than
a continuous request/response cycle. When it comes to realtime communication,
WebSockets require less bandwidth and provide lower latency compared to HTTP,
reducing the load on both the client and the server.
* Supports text and binary: You can use any text or binary data format for the
data. You could choose a text format to simplify debugging or a compact
binary format to maximize efficiency.
* Bidirectional streaming: As an event-driven technology, WebSocket allows data
to be transferred without the client requesting it. This characteristic is
desirable in scenarios where the client needs to react quickly to an event
(especially ones it cannot predict, such as a fraud alert).
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WEBSOCKET WEAKNESSES
While WebSockets have many advantages, they also suffer from some drawbacks:
* Challenging to scale: The WebSocket protocol is stateful. This can be tricky
to handle, especially at scale, because it requires the server layer to keep
track of each individual WebSocket connection and maintain state information.
* Reliability issues: WebSockets don’t automatically recover when connections
are terminated – this is something you need to implement yourself, and is
part of the reason why there are many WebSocket client-side libraries in
existence.
* Firewall problems: Certain environments (such as corporate networks with
proxy servers) will block WebSocket connections.
* No message structure: The event object's lack of structure makes it easy to
keep adding more data to the event, causing it to become bloated.
Consequently, your endpoints can lose their sense of responsibility and
become unwieldy. Additionally, its dynamic nature makes it easy to forget or
add fields by mistake.
* No multiple parallel requests: You can use multiplexing with WebSocket to
improve performance, but you must either use a third-party library or support
it in your code. Both options add complexity to your project.
Read more on the strengths and weaknesses of WebSockets
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WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN GRPC AND WEBSOCKET?
gRPC and WebSockets both fundamentally enable sending and streaming data, but
that doesn't mean they don’t also have their differences.
gRPC is a communication framework that uses Protobuf as the wire format and
HTTP/2 as the transport protocol. It’s typically used to enable server-server
communication, but is also applicable in the last mile of distributed computing
to connect devices, mobile applications, and browsers to back-end services. For
example, Lyft uses gRPC to enable microservices implemented in different
programming languages to communicate using the same semantic language, then
stream the driver’s location to their Android and iOS apps.
WebSockets, on the other hand, is an application protocol specifically designed
to exchange data in real time between browser and server. It’s frequently
adopted on Android and iOS as well, but developers don’t typically reach for
WebSockets when they need to send or stream data between servers.
It’s worth reiterating that gRPC is a framework built on the HTTP/2 protocol,
whereas WebSockets is “just” a protocol.
In some ways, it would be fairer to compare WebSockets to HTTP/2 although, as
you will now know, gRPC-web cannot use HTTP/2 and downgrades the protocol to
HTTP/1, where request streaming and bidirectional streaming aren’t supported.
This usually makes WebSockets a more attractive option for any project with a
web client.
Now that we have discussed the differences between these technologies, let’s
compare them in one tidy table.
Mode
gRPC
gRPC-Web
WebSockets
Unary
Client sends a single request streaming and gets a single response back
Y
Y
Y
Response streaming (server streaming)
Client sends request to the server and gets a stream to read a sequence of
messages back
Eg A large log file, driver location, or live score
Y with HTTP/2 and Server Sent Events
Y with HTTP/1 and XHR streaming
Y
Request streaming (client streaming)
Client writes a sequence of messages and sends them to the server
Eg A cursor location in a multiplayer environment or speech recognition
Y
N
Y
bidirectional Streaming
Both sides send a sequence of messages using a read-write stream
Eg A chat app
Y
N
Y
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GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET PERFORMANCE
Neither option is inherently more performant than the other. It depends on the
specific needs and constraints of your situation.
However, if you need to send or stream large amounts of data, gRPC is likely to
perform well due to its ability to process multiple requests in parallel and use
the quick and lightweight Protobuf format. According to DreamFactory, gRPC
connections can perform 10x faster than HTTP API connections.
When it comes to real time, WebSockets may be more efficient than gRPC because
it uses a persistent TCP connection that is normally only closed only when
communication is finished. Additionally, WebSockets keeps header overhead to a
minimum, only requiring them for the initial HTTP/1 handshake. By comparison,
gRPC still incurs some latency from headers and reconnecting after periods of
inactivity.
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GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET DATA FORMAT
With gRPC, the .proto file defines and documents the binary data format
explicitly. The binary format is compact, and you can tailor it very precisely
to suit your needs. Some effort is required to design it, but this might be
worthwhile if the data or infrastructure is complicated (for example, if you
have existing components written in different programming languages).
WebSocket has no “official” format specification - it can use any binary or text
format. You can use standard options like JSON, Protobuf, and MessagePack, or
create your own custom format if necessary.
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GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET BENCHMARK
Unfortunately, there aren’t any public benchmarks comparing gRPC and WebSockets
directly. There are two likely reasons for this.
First, gRPC is a framework, while WebSockets is a protocol. It might make more
sense to compare WebSockets with the underlying protocol used by gRPC which is
HTTP/2, or HTTP/1 in the case of gRPC-web.
Second, although gRPC and WebSocket capabilities overlap, they are normally
adopted for fundamentally different purposes. gRPC is typically used to enable
server-server communication with high throughput (for example, streaming logs
between microservices). By comparison, WebSockets are designed first and
foremost for web browsers, so you wouldn’t necessarily consider them to enable
server-server communication in the first place.
Understanding the characteristics of gRPC and WebSockets above can help you
determine which is best for your situation, but running your own benchmark is
the only way to accurately measure their performance based on your specific
needs. This allows you to adjust variables such as batch size, compression
configuration, concurrent connections, and target latency, and see the impact on
events per second (EPS) and CPU utilization.
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GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET SECURITY
gRPC supports Transport Layer Security (TLS) for encryption and authentication.
Note that you can use Google's ALTS variant of TLS (when the app is running on
the Google Cloud Platform). You can also use token-based authentication (such as
OAuth2) as an extra level of security for your gRPC application.
With WebSocket, you can use TLS for encryption via the wss: URL scheme (similar
to https). WebSocket doesn't impose any particular authentication method; you
can use any of the methods that are typically available for HTTP, such as
cookies, HTTP authentication, or TLS authentication. You can also implement your
own mechanism (such as token-based authentication) if this suits your needs
better.
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GRPC VS. WEBSOCKET SCALABILITY
WebSocket is a stateful protocol, which relies on both sides (but especially the
server) storing information about the connection state and history of previous
messages. You need more complex code to keep track of the state; additionally,
the client can only communicate with a server process that has access to the
current state. This can make it hard to scale out to a large number of WebSocket
connections (for example, load balancing between servers is tricky). That’s not
to say you can’t scale to handle millions of concurrent WebSocket connections;
it’s just incredibly difficult to do it right.
HTTP ( used by gRPC) is stateless, meaning that any information needed to
maintain communication gets retransmitted with each request/response exchange.
Although this involves inefficient repetition of data in the headers, it also
ensures that server processes are interchangeable, since none of them needs to
remember anything about the clients they are communicating with. Consequently,
scaling up to large numbers of connections is somewhat less complex than scaling
WebSockets. However, as WebSockets are generally less resource-intensive than
HTTP and more efficient at transmitting data, scaling a gRPC system requires
more computing power and bandwidth compared to scaling a WebSocket-based system
of similar size.
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SHOULD I USE GRPC OR WEBSOCKET?
Whether you should use gRPC or WebSockets depends on the specifics of your use
case. Below, we list the most common scenarios where gRPC / WebSocket is a
strong choice.
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WHEN TO USE GRPC
* Connecting polyglot services in a microservices-style architecture.
* Connecting client devices (e.g., mobile devices) to backend services (ideally
use cases that don’t involve high-frequency data updates).
* Connecting point-to-point realtime services that need to handle streaming
requests or responses.
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WHEN TO USE WEBSOCKET
* Realtime updates, where the communication is unidirectional, and the server
is streaming low-latency (and often frequent) updates to the client. Think of
live score updates, newsfeeds, alerts, and notifications, to name just a few
use cases.
* bidirectional communication, where both the client and the server send and
receive messages. Examples include chat, virtual events, and virtual
classrooms (the last two usually involve features like live polls, quizzes,
and Q&As). WebSockets can also be used to underpin multi-user for remote
procedure calls between client and server applications.synchronized
collaboration functionality, such as multiple people editing the same
document simultaneously.
* Fanning out (broadcasting) the same message to multiple users at once.
Various WebSocket libraries implement broadcasting over WebSockets (usually
via pub/sub messaging). In contrast, gRPC does not natively support
broadcasting.
Read more on WebSocket use cases
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ABLY: AN ALTERNATIVE SOLUTION FOR REALTIME EXPERIENCES
As you can now see, both gRPC and WebSockets have their limitations when it
comes to adding real time functionality to mobile and web applications.
While gRPC is a powerful framework, it's not a good fit for web browsers due to
its dependence on HTTP/2. Although you can use a proxy to enable server
streaming on the web, request streaming and bidirectional streaming are still
not possible.
That makes WebSockets look like an attractive option for web clients until you
remember they require additional work to achieve the delivery and scaling
guarantees necessary to deliver a seamless real time experience in production.
Scaling WebSockets is non-trivial because of their stateful nature - in addition
to configuring a load balancer, you would need to write additional code to keep
track of each individual connection and maintain state information across
servers. What’s more, since WebSockets is “just” a protocol, there’s a lot of
work needed to ensure messages arrive exactly once and in the correct order,
even in the face of network issues.
Enter Ably.
Ably is a realtime experience infrastructure, and an alternative to using raw
WebSockets. Our APIs and SDKs help developers build and deliver realtime
experiences without having to worry about maintaining and scaling messy
WebSocket infrastructure.
Key Ably features and capabilities:
* Pub/sub messaging over serverless WebSockets, with rich features such as
message delta compression, automatic reconnections with continuity, user
presence, message history, and message interactions.
* A globally-distributed network of datacenters and edge acceleration
points-of-presence.
* Guaranteed message ordering and delivery.
* Global fault tolerance and a 99.999% uptime SLA.
* < 65ms round-trip latency (P99).
* Dynamic elasticity, so we can quickly scale to handle any demand (billions of
WebSocket messages sent to millions of pub/sub channels and WebSocket
connections).
Explore our documentation to find out more and get started with a free Ably
account
On this page
1. What is gRPC?
1. What is gRPC-web?
2. gRPC strengths
3. gRPC weaknesses
2. What is WebSocket?
1. WebSocket strengths
2. WebSocket weaknesses
3. What are the differences between gRPC and WebSocket?
1. gRPC vs. WebSocket performance
2. gRPC vs. WebSocket data format
3. gRPC vs. WebSocket benchmark
4. gRPC vs. WebSocket security
5. gRPC vs. WebSocket scalability
4. Should I use gRPC or WebSocket?
1. When to use gRPC
2. When to use WebSocket
5. Ably: An alternative solution for realtime experiences
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