Session-Based vs JWT Authentication: A Practical Guide

1. The Problem Both Approaches Solve HTTP is a stateless protocol . Every request your browser sends to a server is, from the server's perspective, completely independent — the server has no built-in memory of who you are or what you did in previous requests. This creates an obvious problem for authentication. Once you log in, how does the server know who you are on the next request? You can't re-send your password with every click — that would be insecure, slow, and impractical. The solution is