Server-Sent Events (SSE) is often overshadowed by its two big brothers — Web Sockets and Long-Polling. However, there are many practical use cases for using SSE. Updating dynamic content, sending push notifications, and streaming data in Real-time are just a few of the applications that SSE can be utilized for. This post will explain SSE, when to use it, and implement a simple SSE application with FastAPI.
What is SSE
Traditionally, a web page has to send a request to the server to receive new data; that is, the page requests data from the server. With server-sent events, it’s possible for a server to send new data to a web page at any time, by pushing messages to the web page. MDN
What does this mean? Essentially, Server-Sent Events (SSE) enable users to subscribe to a stream of real-time data. Anytime this data stream updates, users can see new events in real-time. If you have worked with Long-Polling or Web Socket applications in the past, you may be wondering what’s the big deal about SSE?
SSE vs Web Sockets
Websockets are a bidirectional form of communication between servers. They are typically used to build chat rooms or multiplayer video games as these applications require constant communication between servers and clients. You can think of SSE as a unidirectional websocket. Only the server can send messages to subscribed clients. There are many web applications where web sockets maybe overkill. For example, updating the price of an item on a product page does not need bidirectional communication. The server simply needs one-way communication to update prices for all of its clients. This is a perfect use case for SSE.
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