What is upload and download speed?

[Carlos1010]

What do they both mean and please give me an example of both of them. Also what are good speeds for them for gaming? Thanks in advanced!

[Electronics Wizardy]

How much data can be transferred. Download is to your computer upload is from your system. Gaming needs about 1-5mb/s up and down, But faster network will let more people use it at once and allow you do do things like hd/4k youtube/

[aeroencychris]

The unit of "internet speed" is quite literally what it means, megabits per second. That much data can be transferred from the server to the client (your computer) in one second. Of course it all has to be spread through all the clients on your network and etc etc

[suchamoneypit]

When you ask for something, your uploading, when you recieving what you asked for, thats downloading.

 

When you type in google.com, you sent a message saying "please send me the information to load google.com", this is done using your upload bandwidth. Google.com then responds by sending you all the information to load the website, for google, this is an upload, but for you, its a download.

 

Because of this, you use a LOT more download bandwidth than upload, because for upload all your doing is asking for the info, then downloading it all. This is why internet speeds are typically favored for download, 150/25 being 150mbps for download bandwidth, and 25 mbps for upload bandwidth. For gaming 25/5 is more than enough, 5/1 would even be sufficent (but stuff like video streaming would be awful). That is with one user, even with 25/5 if everyone in your house is streaming video your experience will suffer.

 

When gaming, it can depend too. If your playing an MMO like ESO, download is good because your loading a lot of stuff and players, however, if your playing a competitive game or hosting a game lobby, your also constantly sending information about player position, skills, if you shot your gun, ect.

 

A server uses a lot of upload bandwith because when you send this upload information of "I moved 2 feet to the right", the server then has to send that info to every other player in the game (upload) so their games know where you are. In the same way your constantly downloading from the server because its constantly sending you information about other players and actions. I find this quite cool because to you your just playing a game, but your oblivious to the fact about the sheer amount of information currently being thrown between you, a server, a 40 other players constantly thats allowing this to happen.

[NumLock21]

Download = The speed your computer is download a file from the internet.

e.g. You are downloading a game on Steam. You want to have the highest download speed, so it gets done faster

 

Upload = The speed where your computer uploads a file to the internet

e.g. You want to send a gaming video clip to a friend. The faster your upload is, the faster it sends.

[Carlos1010]

2 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

Download = The speed your computer is download a file from the internet.

e.g. You are downloading a game on Steam. You want to have the highest download speed, so it gets done faster

 

Upload = The speed where your computer uploads a file to the internet

e.g. You want to send a gaming video clip to a friend. The faster your upload is, the faster it sends.

So when you send a email it is upload?

[Oshino Shinobu]

2 minutes ago, Carlos1010 said:

So when you send a email it is upload?

Yes. The email is uploaded to your email provider's server, then it is sent to the recipient(s). 

[NumLock21]

1 minute ago, Carlos1010 said:

So when you send a email it is upload?

Yes it's uploading because you're attaching a file from your computer to the internet.  Most ISP will set a much lower upload than download.

[suchamoneypit]

10 minutes ago, Carlos1010 said:

So when you send a email it is upload?

Think of my analogies. It is an upload. why? because in order to send the email, you need to give it to someone. A send is an upload, a receive is a download.

 

Upload examples:

 

posting a video to youtube (high bandwidth)

making a tweet ( low bandwidth)

making a forum post ( low bandwidth)

sending an email ( low bandwidth)

sending player information during a game ( low bandwidth)

 

Download Examples:

 

streaming video (high bandwidth) 

loading any website ( low bandwidth)

loading game/map information in a game ( low bandwidth)

recieving player movement/position information during a game ( low bandwidth )

 

EDIT:

 

more advanced knowledge, all information passed around the internet is in the form of a "packet". Think of it like a letter ( like mailing a letter). When you stream a video(download), you are getting a LOT of packets all containing information on the video so you can watch it, so its very high bandwidth, however, when you send an email (upload) it needs very few packets to get this information sent, so its very low bandwidth to send and receive email (however, if the email contains a lot of pictures or videos, this changes!). Thinking back to how a server works, say your in a game with 39 other people,when you move, you sent a packet with your updated position information to the server (upload), however, when the server recieves this packet (download), it then has to send(upload) a packet with this updated information to all 39 other players, so 39 packets. Now imagine whats it like with all 40 players moving! Its quite the exchange of packets and information.

 

[NumLock21]

If you have Verizon Fios in your area, then their upload is the same as their download

http://campaign.verizon.com/fasterspeeds/?CMP=DMC-CVZ_ZZ_FD_Z_DO_N_X00002