bytes received/bytes sent

Good Morn. Can someone explain in simple terms what the values in "bytes sent and bytes received" represent. Are these collective results for each on line session or for each independent download, sent from whom, received by whom, and is the received always larger by nearly 10 times. This question was asked by my grandson and I had no answer. Thanks in advance for any help

 

If I may add a little...

The question of whether you're looking at sent and received for a session or for a download is determined by what you're looking at.

In fact, if you are looking at a meter that changes all the time while you're on the net, it could be measuring your 'net traffic', or perhaps what you are doing in a particular download. And you could be looking at instant download/upload speeds and/or a cumulative total.

If you have a cumulative total, what is showing will depend on when it started measuring. It could be from the start of the month or the start of the session or the start of the download. Different things measure different quantities.

If the measuring just appeared in a panel when you started to download something, like a program, for example, you would probably be looking at the download for that item. But if you are seeing upload figures as well, you are probably looking at net traffic for your session, which may be adding on to what you had before you started.