How we take a look at VPNs

VPN customers have an unbelievable quantity of alternative out there, however numerous these decisions are dangerous. Upwards of 180 digital non-public networks can be found for business customers alone. For the informal person who simply needs a VPN to guard themselves on-line or change their digital location, the chance of study paralysis may be very actual.

It would not assist that VPN suppliers like to make deceptive claims about their very own product. Learn a number of of their homepages and you may begin to see some phrases repeat. “Lightning-fast.” “Financial institution-grade encryption.” “Zero-logs coverage.” It is designed to sound good with out which means a lot, and sadly, even the very best suppliers love to speak like this.

Our workforce at Engadget began digging into the VPN world that can assist you reduce by way of all this muddle and decide the supplier you truly need and want. We have developed a rigorous testing course of that mixes investigative journalism, goal testing and qualitative evaluation. This text explains how we analysis and take a look at a VPN.

Replace, Might 28, 2025: This story has been utterly overhauled to replicate the up to date 2025 Engadget VPN testing methodology.

Desk of contents

Our course of at a look

Verify the desk for a fast illustration of our VPN testing course of.

VPN testing: Our 11 steps

A fast notice earlier than we begin — at any time when we are saying “VPN” on this article, we’re referring to a business VPN, the type any particular person can obtain and use. Company VPNs like Cisco Safe Shopper and Perimeter81 require a unique testing course of.

1. Set up and configure the VPN on a number of platforms

Probably the most work you will seemingly need to do with a VPN comes if you obtain and set up it. We run by way of that course of on as many various platforms as potential. After we cannot hit all of them, we attempt to get not less than one in every class — desktop, cell, sensible TV and browser — plus the “huge 4” of Home windows, Mac, iOS and Android.

We take cautious notes on the entire course of, attempting to suppose from the attitude of somebody who has by no means used a VPN earlier than. How simple is it to search out the set up file? How do you log out and in? Are there quality-of-life options, like a programmable auto-connect to avoid wasting work the following time you open the VPN app?

After putting in every VPN, we run by way of the fundamental duties of connecting, disconnecting and altering server places. If these go easily, 90 p.c of customers will face only a few issues with the interface. However, any hiccups on the fundamental connection course of bode poorly for the operability of the VPN’s extra superior options.

2. Take a look at speeds

We take it with no consideration {that a} VPN will cut back your searching speeds. Besides in sure uncommon instances the place your ISP has severely misconfigured your native pathways, it isn’t potential for a VPN to present you quicker speeds than your regular web service. Which means the “quickest VPN” is the one which drags down your regular speeds as little as potential.

We use Ookla’s velocity testing software program to verify every VPN’s servers in three classes. Obtain velocity describes how a lot information can transfer from an internet server to your system in a single second; this determines how shortly internet pages load and when streaming movies must buffer. Add velocity is identical in reverse, and issues most for torrenting, social media sharing and outbound communication out of your pc.

The third metric is latency, measured by the size of a “ping” — the time in milliseconds {that a} single information packet takes to journey between your system and the net. Latency, which is extremely depending on distance, is vital for something that occurs on-line in actual time, like gaming or video chat.

All three velocity stats can fluctuate as particular person server hundreds change. To get a transparent image of efficiency throughout the complete community, we decide six server places for every VPN, together with the one the app designates because the quickest. We then take a look at every location 3 times throughout two days, averaging every outcome to get a remaining rating.

3. Take a look at safety

A VPN’s most vital job is to maintain your actual IP handle hidden. If it could actually’t do this, we won’t suggest it. The only means we take a look at a VPN’s safety is by checking our IP handle whereas linked. If the VPN server is hermetic, any IP lookup device ought to present the server’s handle, not our residence community.

IP leaks — wherein your private home IP handle is seen even when you’re linked by way of a VPN — are most frequently brought on by VPNs utilizing public DNS servers that make your requests seen to your web supplier. The perpetrator can be a misconfiguration in real-time communication protocols (WebRTC) or a failure to correctly incorporate IPv6 site visitors.

We additionally verify for weak, outdated VPN protocols like PPTP, or untested proprietary protocols with no out there supply code. We end this step by testing the VPN’s encryption by analyzing a number of information packets utilizing Wireshark.

4. Take a look at pricing and offers

Subsequent, we see how a lot the VPN prices. We learn the fantastic print on multi-year offers to see if marketed financial savings cease after the primary billing interval; when VPNs supply “bonus months” for brand spanking new sign-ups, it is common for costs to go up later. We additionally consider any free plans, non permanent free trials or money-back ensures — paying particular consideration to the refunds, as VPNs sometimes refuse to honor their acknowledged insurance policies.

We shut out by seeing if there are any particular pricing reductions or coupons that will make the VPN extra inexpensive. In the end, we attempt to make a name about whether or not the VPN offers the person sufficient worth to justify its value.

5. Take a look at pricing bundles

Most of the high VPNs are increasing their choices into bigger bundles, like NordVPN Full, Surfshark One, or ExpressVPN‘s Id Guard suite. This will additionally occur from the opposite route, as firms like Norton and Proton add VPNs to their present product traces.

VPN bundles virtually at all times come at a further subscription price, which they often earn with added worth — and generally do not. At any time when we evaluation a VPN, we take a look at the merchandise related to it and advise you on whether or not or to not heed the VPN’s inevitable calls to improve.

6. Shut-read the privateness coverage

The subsequent step is to sit down down with the VPN’s privateness coverage and browse it like a lawyer would. A VPN privateness coverage is technically legally binding, in that the supplier could be sued for false promoting in the event that they violate it. As an alternative of mendacity outright, the less-trustworthy VPNs reduce their threat by hiding controversial practices behind imprecise language and loopholes.

For example, a VPN may declare on its homepage to have a “zero-logs coverage,” however it’s unattainable to offer VPN service with out maintaining not less than some logs. The trustworthy suppliers lay out precisely what information they maintain, how they anonymize it and what they do with it. Purple flags embody saving your information for longer than obligatory, logging exercise for non-security functions like advertising, or claiming that the privateness coverage doesn’t apply to companions or father or mother firms.

7. Verify the VPN’s potential to alter geolocation

When a VPN modifications your digital location, it wants to take action in a means vacation spot servers cannot see by way of. The websites you’d need to change your location for, like Netflix, YouTube and sports activities streams, block content material in areas the place they do not have a licensing settlement to stream it (that is why Netflix libraries change in each nation). These websites know VPNs can circumvent their blocks, in order that they ban VPN entry at any time when they detect it.

The perfect VPNs combat again by updating their server IP addresses shortly sufficient that streaming platforms cannot block them. We take a look at a VPN’s unblocking potential by connecting to a number of streaming web sites — every in a number of completely different international locations — and searching for proxy errors. We verify to see if content material is accessible and whether or not speeds stay quick sufficient to view it.

8. Examine the server community

A VPN’s “server community” is the choice of IP addresses it lets customers connect with. Massive server networks are a typical promoting level for VPNs, which argue that extra servers means higher efficiency and extra places means extra choices to bypass blocks.

Whereas it is true {that a} bigger community is an efficient signal, it is simple to artificially inflate the numbers. For one factor, a VPN supplier can arrange digital servers with IPs from places the place it is not bodily current. That is useful for getting places in international locations like China and India that ban most VPNs, however means you may’t at all times belief {that a} server which appears near you truly is.

It is also frequent for suppliers to hire server area from third-party information facilities to get extra places out sooner. Whereas handy, this provides extra potential failure factors, for the reason that information heart operators might not observe the VPN’s safety requirements (that is how NordVPN was briefly compromised in 2018).

When reviewing a VPN, we examine not simply the amount of its server community, but in addition its high quality. If it would not disclose which servers are digital and/or rented, we verify the IP addresses of suspicious places and analysis whether or not the VPN has labored with information heart suppliers.

Most VPNs embody options past the core potential to connect with a server. These extras vary from very important safety measures like kill switches (which reduce you off from the web in case you aren’t linked to a VPN server) to tangential nice-to-haves like advert and malware blockers (which regularly work nicely however cannot substitute a delegated antivirus).

We take a look at two issues: whether or not these options work and whether or not they’re simple for novices to make use of. The previous relies on the function — for instance, for an ad-blocker, we’ll see if it blocks several types of adverts. The latter is qualitative and relies on the place the function is discovered within the VPN app, how nicely it explains itself and what customization choices exist.

10. Use the customer support choices

No VPN shopper is so nicely designed that you will by no means need assistance. Good buyer help begins with an up-to-date data base written in clear English by a human creator, with logical group and loads of screenshots. An lively person neighborhood is a bonus, whether or not hosted on the VPN web site or some other place (typically Reddit).

Most VPNs produce other tech help choices, typically reside chat and/or electronic mail tickets. We take a look at each by submitting a easy query. With reside chat, we decide whether or not it is potential to speak with a human and the way lengthy it takes to achieve that time. With electronic mail, we measure how lengthy it takes to get a reply from the specialists and the way helpful it’s for fixing the issue.

11. Examine the VPN’s background

Step one is to search out out precisely who we’re coping with. We comb by way of the VPN’s historical past since its launch, searching for any safety breaches, violations of its personal privateness coverage or any makes an attempt to tug the wool over the shoppers’ eyes. Information archives are the very best supply, however we additionally incorporate educational analysis by safety investigators and printed third-party audits of the VPNs themselves.

After we discover black marks on a VPN’s document, we attempt to place them in context. A previous safety breach would not essentially disqualify a VPN from our suggestion — a lot of the greatest choices have slipped up not less than as soon as. The perfect proof comes from how the supplier responded to the incident. Did they modify something or double down? Did their restoration produce lasting enhancements, or did the identical downside occur once more a yr later?

Privateness violations are rather more severe. A VPN that breaks its settlement to not log info on its customers can’t be trusted to maintain its phrase sooner or later with out proof of drastic inside change. One other main purple flag is a scarcity of transparency, like when it is unclear the place a VPN relies or who owns it.

Get began with our VPN opinions

Reviewing a VPN is a matter of affected person investigation, rigorous testing and an unwillingness to take something at face worth. We’re consistently refining our course of, so we’ll ensure that to replace this web page at any time when we alter any of the steps above.

Now that you simply perceive our course of, you are able to dive into our protection of the best VPN services (quickly to get an intensive replace), or head straight to our in-depth ExpressVPN review to see the method in motion.