Estudio comparativo de tres protocolos de comunicación en IoT: implementación y análisis en entornos de laboratorio

Abstract

The Internet of Things (IoT) has revolutionized the way devices collect, process and share information, from environmental sensors to automation systems in homes and industry, increasing the number of connected devices every day. However, efficient communication between these devices becomes a major challenge that often goes unnoticed: choosing the right protocol at the application layer level. Choosing the wrong protocol can lead to performance, power consumption or security problems, especially when it comes to projects that require high efficiency or operate with limited resources. This study focuses on the comparison of three of the most widely used communication protocols in IoT environments: HTTP, MQTT and CoAP, with the objective of analyzing their advantages and limitations in laboratory environments, evaluating variables such as latency, energy consumption, bandwidth usage and security. To this end, three versions of an air quality monitoring station were implemented, each using one of these protocols. The tests were carried out with the ESP32 microcontroller, where temperature, humidity and carbon dioxide concentration (PPM) parameters were measured.