The Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model is a reference model developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) that "provides a common basis for the coordination of standards development for the purpose of systems interconnection."

In the OSI reference model, the components of a communication system are distinguished in seven abstraction layers: Physical, Data Link, Network, Transport, Session, Presentation, and Application.

The model describes communications from the physical implementation of transmitting bits across a transmission medium to the highest-level representation of data of a distributed application. Each layer has well-defined functions and semantics and serves a class of functionality to the layer above it and is served by the layer below it. Established, well-known communication protocols are decomposed in software development into the model's hierarchy of function calls.

The Internet protocol suite as defined in RFC 1122 and RFC 1123 is a model of networking developed contemporarily to the OSI model, and was funded primarily by the U.S. Department of Defense. It was the foundation for the development of the Internet. It assumed the presence of generic physical links and focused primarily on the software layers of communication, with a similar but much less rigorous structure than the OSI model.

In comparison, several networking models have sought to create an intellectual framework for clarifying networking concepts and activities,^{[citation needed]} but none have been as successful as the OSI reference model in becoming the standard model for discussing and teaching networking in the field of information technology. The model allows transparent communication through equivalent exchange of protocol data units (PDUs) between two parties, through what is known as peer-to-peer networking (also known as peer-to-peer communication). As a result, the OSI reference model has not only become an important piece among professionals and non-professionals alike, but also in all networking between one or many parties, due in large part to its commonly accepted user-friendly framework.

The development of the OSI model started in the late 1970s to support the emergence of the diverse computer networking methods that were competing for application in the large national networking efforts in the world (see OSI protocols and Protocol Wars). In the 1980s, the model became a working product of the Open Systems Interconnection group at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). While attempting to provide a comprehensive description of networking, the model failed to garner reliance during the design of the Internet, which is reflected in the less prescriptive Internet Protocol Suite, principally sponsored under the auspices of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

In the early- and mid-1970s, networking was largely either government-sponsored (NPL network in the UK, ARPANET in the US, CYCLADES in France) or vendor-developed with proprietary standards, such as IBM's Systems Network Architecture and Digital Equipment Corporation's DECnet. Public data networks were only just beginning to emerge, and these began to use the X.25 standard in the late 1970s.

The Experimental Packet Switched System in the UK c. 1973–1975 identified the need for defining higher-level protocols. The UK National Computing Centre publication, Why Distributed Computing, which came from considerable research into future configurations for computer systems, resulted in the UK presenting the case for an international standards committee to cover this area at the ISO meeting in Sydney in March 1977.