Modern software rises or falls on how fast it responds. This is why so many companies are moving away from older network protocols and turning to QUIC and MoQ.
QUIC, or Quick UDP Internet Connections, replaces the slow, rigid behavior of TCP with something far more flexible. It runs over UDP and removes the old handshake delays that were always baked into TCP. It avoids the chain reaction where one lost packet blocks everything else. It encrypts everything by default. And it scales across poor mobile networks without forcing your users to wait.
By mid-2025, QUIC has become a standard across the public internet, with companies like Google, Meta, and Cloudflare using it at massive scale. APNIC reports steady growth in QUIC traffic as more servers join in. If you run a SaaS platform with messaging, collaboration, data sync, or media-heavy features, ignoring QUIC means giving your competitors a performance edge you could already have.
This guide breaks down QUIC and MoQ, so you can see if they belong in your product roadmap.
⚙️ Learn more about our QUIC & MoQ development expertise
Key Takeaways
- QUIC speeds up modern internet traffic by removing handshake delays, allowing independent streams, and avoiding the blocking issues that slow down TCP.
- MoQ builds on QUIC to deliver fast, resilient media, giving businesses sub-second latency for both interactive and broadcast scenarios.
- Legacy protocols like HLS, RTSP, SRT, and WebRTC cannot match MoQ’s balance of speed, scalability, browser support, and cost efficiency.
- Companies adopting QUIC and MoQ see lower latency, improved reliability, and better retention across real-time apps, SaaS platforms, and live streaming products.
MoQ: Media Over QUIC and the Future of Real-Time Streaming
MoQ, or Media over QUIC, builds on the strengths of QUIC and tunes them for audio, video, and other continuous media. Instead of using multiple protocols stitched together with workarounds, MoQ delivers one clean transport built specifically for streaming.
It handles multiple media tracks inside one connection without slowing down when the network stutters. It encrypts data by default. It sends recovery data only when needed so your stream doesn’t freeze. And because it reuses QUIC’s structure, it avoids the browser and firewall headaches that plague older systems.
Cloudflare launched the world’s first global MoQ relay network in August 2025, with coverage in more than 330 cities. The company reports drastically lower latency for live events, even when viewers connect from different continents.
Swedish broadcaster SVT tested MoQ in the World Rally Championship and achieved 150 ms end-to-end latency, which is close to real time and far faster than typical streaming stacks. These numbers matter because streaming studies show that every extra second of delay can drop engagement by 20 percent or more.
AWS has also been pushing QUIC forward. With QUIC support on their load balancers, they report a 25-30 percent reduction in end-to-end latency. In practice, that means cutting a sluggish 500 ms response down to around 350 ms – fast enough to feel instant to the user.
MoQ is gaining traction for a reason. It solves the real problems that slow down video, live events, and interactive sessions. It gives founders and product owners a modern media pipeline without the old compromises.
Why Legacy Protocols Struggle – and How MoQ Solves It
Most teams still rely on the same set of legacy streaming options: HLS for wide compatibility, RTSP for studio equipment, SRT for unpredictable networks, and WebRTC for two-way video calls. Each has strengths, but all carry problems that become painful as soon as you want global reach, predictable latency, and browser-friendly delivery.
- HLS works everywhere, but slices video into segments, which leads to delays between five and thirty seconds. TCP’s strict ordering means that if one packet goes missing, the entire stream waits.
- RTSP still appears in professional setups but is infamous for firewall issues, lack of built-in encryption, and poor browser support.
- SRT is great for contribution feeds in tough network conditions, but it is not browser-native and still requires extra tooling.
- WebRTC is the best for real-time two-way video, yet scaling it to thousands of viewers demands expensive SFU clusters, custom routing, and nonstop tuning.
MoQ removes these trade-offs. Because it runs on QUIC, it inherits fast connection setup, built-in TLS 1.3, and true independence between streams. Packet loss affects only what it touches, and not the entire flow. That leads to consistent glass-to-glass latency often between 150 and 400 ms. It supports interactive and broadcast models at the same time. And it scales through lightweight relays and CDNs instead of complex media servers.
Companies like Cloudflare, nanocosmos, and Red5 have reported that MoQ performs better than WebRTC on long-distance routes and beats HLS on delay, while staying simpler than SRT for web deployment. It gives teams a single protocol that serves both small interactive sessions and massive public events.
If your current tech stack forces you to choose between “fast but costly” and “cheap but slow,” MoQ closes that gap.
Ready to leave the old stack behind? Let's talk about what MoQ can do for your product.
What QUIC and MoQ Mean for Your Key Metrics
Most business discussions circle back to cost, performance, reliability, and user satisfaction. QUIC and MoQ touch all four.
QUIC eliminates head-of-line blocking, which is a long-standing weakness of TCP. This upgrade alone increases throughput on shaky mobile networks by up to 40 percent in enterprise tests. For products that rely on real-time communication or fast loading screens, this improvement translates directly to higher engagement.
When you add MoQ, the gains get stronger. MoQ lowers the cost of delivering media at scale because it does not require the heavy server infrastructure that WebRTC needs for large audiences. Multiple streaming providers report that MoQ keeps reliability high over long distances, cutting down on the stalls and drop-offs that frustrate users.
Red5’s 2025 findings note that low-latency MoQ streams increase viewer retention by 15 to 25 percent during live events. The reason is simple: people stay when the experience feels immediate. This holds true for webinars, virtual classrooms, interactive concerts, gaming platforms, or any SaaS tool that relies on smooth real-time media.
For decision-makers, the business message is clear. QUIC and MoQ reduce the cost of scaling, raise the ceiling for performance, and improve the overall user experience without needing a full rewrite of your existing infrastructure.
A Practical Path to Building QUIC and MoQ Into Your Product
Bringing QUIC and MoQ into your software does not have to feel complicated. The easiest path is to start with a small QUIC relay or a prototype that targets one specific latency bottleneck. Most teams see meaningful results quickly, even before they integrate MoQ for media.
Once your QUIC transport is stable, you can introduce MoQ for the parts of your system that handle audio, video, or real-time data. There are open tools and evolving standards from the IETF that make early adoption easier. For lean teams, a basic proof-of-concept is often possible within a few weeks. We’ve helped early-stage founders and enterprise groups do exactly that: test the gains, measure the impact, and build a roadmap that fits their existing architecture.
There are realistic challenges. Over-multiplexing can overload CPUs if you do not tune your streams correctly. Some CDNs still catch up slowly with MoQ adoption. And your team needs to monitor how connections behave across different geographic regions.
But none of these challenges are deal-breakers. With the right engineering support, you can introduce QUIC and MoQ in a predictable way that aligns with your business goals instead of disrupting them. This approach avoids the guesswork and gets you to measurable results faster.
FAQ
Is QUIC mature enough for production use?
Yes. QUIC is used at global scale by Google, Meta, Cloudflare, and countless SaaS platforms. It is fully production-ready in modern browsers and networks.
Does MoQ replace WebRTC?
Not entirely. WebRTC still shines for peer-to-peer calls. MoQ is better for scalable one-to-many or many-to-many media delivery, and both can coexist depending on your use case.
Is it expensive to adopt QUIC and MoQ?
Costs depend on your scope, but most companies save money in the long run because QUIC and MoQ reduce the need for heavy infrastructure and help avoid performance issues that drive user churn.
How long does a proof-of-concept take?
We can build a QUIC prototype within a few weeks. Adding MoQ depends on your media requirements, but early results often arrive quickly.
Do CDNs support MoQ?
Support is growing fast. Cloudflare already deploys a global MoQ relay network, and more CDN providers are joining as standards mature.
Conclusion
QUIC and MoQ speed up your product, simplify your stack, and help you serve users across the globe with less friction and lower costs. They are not the right choice for every project, but if you build anything that depends on speed, real-time responsiveness, or high-quality streaming, they can give you an advantage that older systems simply cannot match.
⚙️ Learn more about our QUIC & MoQ development expertise
If you want help understanding whether QUIC and MoQ fit your current architecture, drop us a line or book a consultation today! We’ll walk you through the options and help you build a system that performs well today and scales even better tomorrow.
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