Uploading

In short: Sending data from your own device to a remote server.

In more detail: The counterpart to downloading — your own machine is the sender here. Many residential internet connections are asymmetric, with significantly lower upload than download bandwidth, since most users receive more than they send.

In Depth

The typical asymmetry of many internet connections (e.g. VDSL: often 5 to 10 times more download than upload bandwidth) reflects historical usage patterns, in which consumption (loading web pages, streaming) clearly dominated. This becomes a noticeable bottleneck for certain modern use cases:

• Cloud backups and sync services (e.g. large photo collections, video projects) need to upload data, not download it.
• Video calls and livestreaming continuously send video/audio data away from your own device.
• Self-hosting (running your own server on a home network) requires upload bandwidth to reliably answer requests from outside.

Symmetric connections (fibre with identical down-/upload speed) are increasingly becoming standard mainly because of these use cases, while classic DSL/cable usually keeps the asymmetry. For web applications like the Emzett shop, uploading is mainly relevant when uploading images (product photos, profile pictures) and file attachments in the chat/ticket system.

See also: Downloading, Bandwidth