| Protocol | Feature | Energy-balancing | Transmission Reliability | Scalability | Energy Conservation |
| Flooding | flooding | good | good | poor | poor |
| Gossiping | randomly | moderate | moderate | poor | moderate |
| TEEN | hierarchical | moderate | moderate | good | good |
| SPIN | negotiation | poor | moderate | moderate | good |
| DD | Query-driven | poor | moderate | moderate | moderate |
| LEACH | cluster | poor | moderate | moderate | moderate |