Brightness v Exposure

Questions you are embarassed to ask

I have been trying various RAW converters and they all have a Brightness adjustment and an Exposure adjustment. I cannot see any dfiffence. Am I missing something?

Exposure adjustment adjusts contrast as well as brightness to stop the image looking too washed-out or dull.

That's a gross simplification, but it is something like that.

If the program has a histogram, watch that as you adjust the controls to see more precisely how they differ.