What it means
آپلود (âplod) means “upload” and is a direct loanword from English, parallel in structure and usage to its counterpart دانلود (dânlod). It functions as a noun (the upload, or the act of uploading) and as the base of the verbal construction آپلود کردن (âplod kardan) “to upload.” The Academy of Persian Language coined بارگذاری (bârgozâri) as the preferred native equivalent, meaning roughly “placing a load” or “putting something up,” and bârgozâri appears in some formal and official interfaces. In practice, آپلود is the word people actually use when talking about posting a photo to Instagram, sending a file to the cloud, or submitting a document online. The two words, دانلود and آپلود, are almost always learned and used as a pair.
How to use it
- عکس رو آپلود کردم. (‘aks ro âplod kardam.) “I uploaded the photo.”
- فایل هنوز داره آپلود میشه. (fâyl hanuz dâre âplod mishe.) “The file is still uploading.”
- سرعت آپلودم خیلی پایینه. (sor’at-e âplodam kheyli pâyine.) “My upload speed is very low.”
- ویدیو رو روی یوتیوب آپلود کن. (video ro ru-ye YouTube âplod kon.) “Upload the video to YouTube.”
Cultural note
آپلود became a household word in Iran with the explosion of social media use, particularly on Instagram, which has been one of the most used platforms among Iranians despite periodic filtering. The phrase آپلود کردن (to upload) is now used for any act of posting or sharing content online, from photos to voice messages on Telegram. Upload speed in Iran, like download speed, has been a recurring complaint given infrastructure limitations and the overhead imposed by VPN usage. The word is also occasionally used humorously in the same way as دانلود, for instance saying someone آپلود کرد (uploaded) meaning they shared too much personal information publicly.