Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for wireless communications by a user equipment (UE) capable of establishing a split bearer involving at least primary and secondary radio link control (RLC) entities. The techniques generally include deciding, based on one or more conditions, whether to submit a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) protocol data unit (PDU) to the primary RLC entity or the secondary RLC entity according to one or more rules and submitting the PDCP PDU to at least one of the primary or secondary RLC entities in accordance with the decision.