What is an RTMP server?

Real-Time Messaging Protocol or RTMP is a communication protocol for live audio and video streaming over the internet. It was developed as a TCP protocol by Macromedia to stream between a Flash Player and a server. Macromedia was later acquired by Adobe and the once proprietary protocol is now an open specification.

So, what is an RTMP server? RTMP server software allows you to take an incoming Real-Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP) live video stream from an encoder and transmux it into a playback protocol like HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) for viewing. 

RTMP today is known for its low-latency video streaming capabilities. To maintain persistent connections during a live stream, the RTMP splits your stream into smaller fragments. The sizes of these fragments can vary dynamically depending on the connection between the source and the server. Sometimes these fragments can also be the same size. The default fragment size is 128 bytes for video data. These smaller chunks of data are easier to transmit over the internet.