Android communication with server, Socket or httpurlconnection?

Question

Android

I am developing an Android client-server application, in which data will be rarely transmitted from the server-> client, but there will be a lot of them, little data will be transmitted from the client side, but they will be transmitted much more often (preferably once every 5 seconds, but can be increased to 10 -15 sec), interaction, mainly in the mobile network, i.e. connection is not stable, may be interrupted.
I found the Socket and httpurlconnection mechanisms, but somehow I didn’t google comparisons between them, Socket, as I understand it, keep a stable connection, and httpurlconnection connects “once” and for a normal exchange you need to do short or long polling, i.e. at first glance, it's better to use Socket, but on the net I see implementations with httpurlconnection more often.
Why don't they use sockets or what do I not understand about using sockets on Android?

Answer 1

Socket and HttpUrlConnection are long outdated libraries. Google recommends using OkHttp. You can see an example of usage here

Answer 2

Well, first you need to decide on the protocol. will you make your own client-server exchange protocol or will you take http.
http is already a standard protocol with all the consequences. and a good client for android.
your protocol - all your desires. but do it yourself.
besides this, you need to take into account that ready-made http clients are already ready for compressed data, for working with REST. for cache. For them, you can immediately work with Retrofitom & json (Gson), or parse it yourself.
Of course, there are ready-made servers for http. it remains to make only answers-scripts.
In addition, often in any corporate network, the administrator prohibits everything except mail & http.
Those. there are quite a few pluses.
But for http, this is the work of the client with the server on request. those. the client sent a request - received a response. The server just doesn't send its data to the client.
If this is important to you, then http will not work.