It goes without saying that a VPN subscription is a worthwhile investment, but it’s also true that a paid VPN isn’t just for everyone. If you’re looking for a free VPN online to keep your devices protected from malicious attackers, keep your personal data private, and take your digital security up a notch overall, this review is for you.
Free VPN Online vs. Paid VPN Online
Free VPN services may cost nothing but there is typically a valid explanation for this— meaning that the company will make a profit in some other way usually by invasive ads or through selling the browsing data to third parties (rather than defeating the privacy campaign in the first place).
Plus free services typically restrict the amount of data you can use and the speed at which you can do it, making it pointless to stream video, torrent, or as an extra layer of reliable protection in your day-to-day online life. And don’t expect the sort of easy-to-access support or server range you get for paying providers, either.
So before we get stuck in our list of the best free VPN online, it’s worth remembering that a paid-for version will cost as little as $2.50 a month, and sometimes even cheaper during Black Friday, and will give you even better performance and protection.
Top Choices for the Best Free VPN Online
TunnelBear
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
TunnelBear may have something of a cartoonish design, but it’s a serious free option, particularly after its acquisition by the security giant, McAfee. There are free and premium subscriptions to choose from.
The main restriction of the free plan is that you are limited to 500MB of traffic per month. That only is a small sum which means that you can use it at a time where you feel like you need some more protection and want to go down the free route. You’re not going to be able to keep it all the time, and you may forget to use this VPN for torrenting and streaming. Obviously, going to a service like ExpressVPN or NordVPN absolutely eases this pressure point.
Hotspot Shield
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
Not only is Hotspot Shield Free one of the better known free VPN solutions in our rankings, but we also consider it to be the best.
Those on the free plan are entitled to 500MB of data a day (about 15GB a month). That might seem limited, but it is actually one of the most generous limitations among its rivals (though of course, not a patch to limitless data that you get with paid-for services).
If security is your main target, then Hotspot is on the same wavelength, boasting ‘military-grade encryption’ – reassuring if you’re banking and shopping online or on a mobile phone.
In addition to security, Hotspot Shield Free also received praise for being so easy to use. Whether it’s a smartphone app or a laptop version, you’re not going to get the frustrating user experience provided by other rivals.
Windscribe
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
Windscribe’s generous data allocation and commitment to protecting your privacy make it one of the best free VPN solutions available. You get 10GB of bandwidth a month as usual and you can select from 10 free Windscribe VPN remote server locations like UK, Hong Kong, Germany, Canada, and US VPN). All you need to do is create a username and password to sign up an email address is optional, but can prove useful if you forget your password).
Windscribe does not store connection logs, IP stamps, or accessed sites; when you are directly connecting to a website, it records your username, the server you are connected to and the amount of data transmitted, but everything is removed within three minutes of the completion of the session.
ProtonVPN
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
ProtonVPN is another service that provides a free VPN in addition to a paid option, but the former has some very strong points. The most noteworthy of which is that it does not place any limitations on data. In other words, you are free to use as much data as you like every month. This is very unusual for a free VPN service and makes it worth considering right away.
There are, of course, restrictions on the free plan to facilitate improvements to a paid-for offer. And ProtonVPN Free’s limitations include restricting you to only one device, just three sites, and offering free users a lower priority when it comes to speed compared to paid subscribers. There is no P2P support either and speeds will decrease at peak hours because a number of users are around and paying customers get priority.
Hide.me
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
Hide.me provides both paying and free VPN providers, which give you 2GB of data per month to play with. There are also other limitations: you can only connect up to a maximum of one device and are limited to five server locations (including the US and Canada VPN) rather than the 50+ locations that subscribers pay for.
One of this service’s good sides is that it will not tamper with the connection speed of free users, and Hide.me also guarantees that it will not hold logs and retain any customer data, so it will not send any data to third parties to try to make a profit (just because it does not have any data to pass on). There aren’t any adverts online, either.
Speedify
Download in Play Store
Download in App Store
As the name suggests, Speedify has one key goal as a free VPN provider: to guarantee that while you benefit from encryption, your internet connection stays as fast as possible. The free plan provides unlimited access to these servers (as with subscription options), the only limitation to the free deal being that you are restricted on the amount of data you can download.
Free users get 2GB of data per month. This isn’t a big allowance, and definitely not as much as any of the other rivals you’ll find elsewhere on this list, but it’s more than some and also enough to accommodate some simple surfing and email activities.
How to Choose the Right Free VPN Service
There’s a lot of difference between free VPN providers, so it’s a smart idea to try a couple and find out which one you like best. A perfect VPN service should be easy to use and understand, and should not pose too many obstacles, even though you’re using a free subscription. We highly recommend checking out a few services before you find the one that works for you, particularly before you take the plunge and pay for a VPN.