A connection-oriented communication service is a communication service model in which the end-systems require a reliable end-to-end data channel through which they can assume that data will be exchanged without errors. Network applications which require a connection oriented communication service are required to use a reliable data transfer (RDT) protocol. RDT protocols typically need some form of connection set-up and tear-down as well as a method of notifying the sending party that data has been received correctly and/or requesting resend of data packets that have either been received with errors or lost due to network congestion.

The transmission control protocol (TCP) is the connection-oriented communication service that is provided by the Internet. As well as reliable data transport, TCP also provides flow control and congestion control.

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