Abstract: The newly developed networks hope to bring some specific features, such as wide coverage, high bandwidth, and provide varieties of media services. Fortunately, multiple access techniques are at there to help. Nowadays，terminals are always equipped with multiple interfaces to adapt to the heterogeneous networks. Thus, there are more than one paths existing between two endpoints. MPTCP (multipath TCP) is proposed by IETF MPTCP working group, in addition to compatible with traditional TCP, which utilizes multiple paths to transmit data. It improves the efficiency of bandwidth usage and the resilience of the connection. What’s more, it can adaptively move data from more congested path to less congested path. In recent years, many researches have been carried out to gradually make MPTCP from concept to practice. This paper introduces the technical details of MPTCP standard, and expounds the present situation of the related aspects, including simulation and actual deployment, out-of-order control, coupled congestion control, energy consumption maintenance, security, and other aspects such as path selection, mobility and QoS, the data center scenario, et al. Finally, this paper gives a summary and expectation.

Key words: multiple path, multipath TCP (MPTCP), scheduling algorithms, congestion control, energy consumption management, security