A system and method for replication of network state for transparent recovery of network connections are provided. The system and method avoid having to identify and intercept the internal non-deterministic events of a network stack by adopting a state-capture approach. This state-capture approach views the network state of the primary and replica application instances from the viewpoint of an external client. In this way, only network state changes of the primary application instance that are communicated to an external client need to be replicated at the replica application instance. Other network state changes, e.g., internal network state changes, that are not communicated to the external client need not be replicated at the replica application instance. In other words, the illustrative embodiments permit differences in internal network state for those network states that are not made public to the external world, i.e. outside the application instance.