Should I use localStorage instead of cookies for a web application designed for mobile browsers?

Question

I am creating a location-based web application that will work mainly on mobile browsers. It will be encoded with HTML5, javascript and PHP. I would like the user to be invited to log in as rarely as practical. I would like them to log in (via PHP) and then stay on for x time.

I know how to do this with cookies, but I experimented with HTML5 localStorage. If I use localStorage, I have to do all the validation using javascript and send it to PHP via Ajax. Since I am thinking how to do this, I am wondering if it is worth using localStorage. As far as I understand, it is more secure than cookies because data is not transmitted with every HTTP request and it cannot be accessed cross-domain. But do modern browsers, such as iOS and Android, not allow cross-domain access to cookies?

Am I just complicating myself using localStorage? What are the reasons for choosing localStorage over cookies in this case?

Answer 1

Cookies and localStorage have two different ways of using, mainly cookies for reading on the server side, and localStorage for reading on the client’s slide.

If your client side needs this data, then yes, use localStorage (you save bandwidth by not sending cookies for every HTTP request [in the headers]). However, if you do not, just use cookies. By providing additional HTTP requests (via ajax) to send the server, cookies are a bit overloaded if everything you do has access to this data on the server side.