Session Description Protocol

The Session Description Protocol (SDP) is a format for describing multimedia communication sessions for the purposes of announcement and invitation.^[1] Its predominant use is in support of streaming media applications, such as voice over IP (VoIP) and video conferencing. SDP does not deliver any media streams itself but is used between endpoints for negotiation of network metrics, media types, and other associated properties. The set of properties and parameters is called a session profile.

SDP is extensible for the support of new media types and formats. SDP was originally a component of the Session Announcement Protocol (SAP),^[2] but found other uses in conjunction with the Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP), the Real-time Streaming Protocol (RTSP), Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), and as a standalone protocol for describing multicast sessions.

The IETF published the original specification as a Proposed Standard in April 1998 (RFC 2327).^[3] Revised specifications were released in 2006 (RFC 4566),^[1] and in 2021 (RFC 8866).^[4]