Leave your thoughts below, would love to see some different perspectives! What are you S-Tiers? 👀 *Don't forget to check out the Techlore Patreon to support the free content!* patreon.com/techlore (Small update: I wasn't aware Proton has a new Linux client-I need to try that out!)
Using IVPN for over 2 years now, love their UI on both mobile as desktop devices but they do also offer all features I need. Only downside for me personally (and I assume for more of us) is that some providers such as IVPN do not offer that much of a wide range of VPN locations, for example I always purchase a week subscription or trial at another VPN provider in order to select Argentina or Turkey which are useful to receive discounts on specific websites, apps and games due their economy.
I use Mozilla VPN partly because it's really just a white label for Mullvad but also because it is in support of the development of Firefox which I think is critically needed at this point.
Firefox is a multi billion dollar company. They don't need your money. Hell there was a report last year saying they have over $1 billion just sitting in the bank as a cash reserve. The vast majority of their money comes from Google paying them to have its search engine as the browser's default. Their CEO nearly earns as much as the amount of yearly donations they receive from the public.
I used Nord for 2 years, ended up switching to IVPN, Proton and Mullvad for a year after hearing opinions from the privacy & security community. I've now gone back to Nord, in terms of speed, servers and client I personally don't feel like any compare. I'm not at all a fan of their marketing techniques but I don't feel like that should really discredit them as a VPN service. Like Henry said, they have got a lot right as a VPN service. IVPN is great though, I just wish they had more servers. Still enjoyed the video!
I was quite surprised by Nord’s ranking. It seems to me that when things become popular, the product got scrutinized much more as well. However, I personally look into product, it’s features and quality when making decision. From what I’ve read Nord proved no logs policy, has diskless servers and everything.
I think you could've separated out the C-tier by focusing on the quality of the clients. Nord, for example, has on-par privacy/security with the others in the C-tier, but their clients are actually really good. They are the first to support new features in the Apple ecosystem like widgets, Apple Silicon, etc.
yea, that really proves the "no log" policy, i don't think they were technically "raided" but whether they were "let in" or not they really have 0 logs so there was really nothing to take
I think the video could have gone in a little more detail with the features, pointing out jurisdictions, where it doesn't matter, what kind of protocol the service uses and things like that. Also reduce a bit the VPN farm palette, since most of them come from the same parent company, so you can fit the critique more consistently
I'm not a tech person. I use Proton on Windows & Mac. I chose them based on my own informal research, & because they don't do RU-vid ads. I'm relieved to learn I didn't screw up. Whew!😅
Putting Perfect Privacy in C-Tier, below Adguard is an absolute shame. They were one of the first providers to use RAM disks back in 2013, they had a server seizure in 2016 which proved their no-log policy, (they also have a warrant canary), their windows client is open source for almost a year now. Did you even do proper research? They micht not be the fastest or best for streaming but privacy wise, they are along the best.
I was just now searching updated comparisons and you uploaded the video. I thought you would compare VPNs with Safing's SPN, which is what I'm puzzles about.. any reason you didn't include SPN on your considerations, or are not even using it at all?
Personally I feel directly comparing the SPN to VPNs is similar to try to compare Tor to VPNs - it's just not a direct comparison since they're different tools. I interviewed the Safing team (devs of SPN) and they thoroughly broke down the whole VPN vs SPN vs Tor discussion: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Myn2MiCV1oU.html
Great video. a nice gateway into a larger converstion. I agree with others that maybe arranging the C tier could have been useful, nonetheless. Anyway I'm essentially commenting to inform you that the VPNPro link, in the description, promoting the 'VPNs owned by same companies' article, and in extension the whole site, appears to be broken. Not sure why. It might be my browser, I already checked my add-ons etc., but I thought I'd let others know. Hopefully it works in the future, it's an important topic. Regards.
ExpressVPN is the worst. 1 server, maybe 2 per location. Google Captchas like crazy, and they're the hard ones too. Most expensive for poor and slow performance. Bought out by kape technologies.
Could be but I moved from ExpressVPN to Proton last year and they are not even close with regards to performance: ExpressVPN is way better and offer better functionality in almost all clients.
@@zedtrek I've never tried Proton so I can't make a comparison, but I've had slower speeds on both their OpenVPN & "proprietary" Wireguard protocol compared to other services in the same city. Not the exact geo location ofc but same advertised city. Sharing that same 1-2 server with potentially 100s of others simultaneously will eat at bandwidth speeds. The annoying Captchas from bad express IPs is super annoying.
From time to time using Proton, I get a pop-up window from somewhere that says my free WIFI connection doesn't accept peer-to-peer connection. I ignore it and it seems to still work normally. I am not savvy enough to understand where that is coming from.
This might be a stupid question but should we be keeping our VPN up to date as you have mentioned not to do this with other apps as it doesn’t actually have any benefits and just takes up more unnecessary space from what I can recall (was a long time ago) so was wondering if same applied for VPN.
Is there a VPN provider in this list that doesn't have a well known list of IP addresses like PIA and some of Proton? A lot of web services use Google's Captcha and they are literally unusable when you use a known VPN connection.
I sort of ignore any vpn list which doesn't include something about vpn restricted coutries like China. In the West we have the entitled luxury of blah, blah, blah about digital rights and privacy, but when it comes to places where it actually matters it's a meh or half excuse. Being able to use a vpn in western countries is like little league practice, and is really meaningless. IVPN and Mullvard's positions are basically the same, just experiment and it may or may not work. On the flip side, you have those heavy market budget vpn's like EVP and Nord along with all their paid for tech writers who swear up and down claiming theirs work in countries like China, but don't. A note about Torguard: they sent out a DMCA warning message to all their private IP customers. Doesn't seem too private to me if their server provider is warning the vpn provider to warn vpn users about their user habits. No Astrill?
People are always so hard on Nord because of "scandals". And then I look them up and they were no big deal. What specific scandal(s) send nord to the bottom after all of the positives you listed?
TBF I would never trust any claims or opinions made by influencers when it comes to NordVPN considering how they pay up to 30k a month on their sponsor program.
Dude yes i like proton but jeesh the linux client sucks i quit looking but can anyone find tunneling on desktop? Also i hope the company skiff makes a vpn
My list is: S: Mullvad & IVPN A: Surfshark & Nord B: VyprVPN, Windscribe, Proton C(ok but not bad): Adguard(just decent but not really good), Perfect Privacy (UI is outdated, pricey, barely any settings in the app(or last I tried)) D(bad): TunnelBear(bought by McAfee (the antivirus company)) F(might as well go without a VPN at this point): Express VPN(Kape, Edward Snowden, Spying on UAE activists, etc), IP Vanish(owned by Kape), PIA(owned by Kape) Unranked: Azire, AirGuard, RiseUp, TorGuard.
@@Ilikewaffles-gt9yz I'm not sure why I didn't get your notification. Or if I did I was busy or something. Sorry for not replying earlier. Edward Snowden publicly called out Express VPN "If you're an ExpressVPN customer, you shouldn't be." - Sep 15, 2021 Via Twitter
Is there a list of which providers have only first party servers, which partially have first party servers and which only have third party servers ? Would be interesting because in my book first party servers are a necessity to trust a vpn
