I need a VPN that doesn’t cause a significant drop in internet speed, and ideally one that will support torrenting in the future. I’m not using torrents right now, but if I need to, it’s important that the VPN supports that technology. I also need a Kill Switch feature and something like NetShield, as in Proton VPN. I’d like to have plenty of servers so there’s one close to me. At the moment, I’m in a country with censorship.
I want to test new VPNs; currently, I’m using Proton. What do you think about Mullvad, IVPN, Windscribe? What are their main differences, drawbacks, and advantages? Which ones do you use and why?
I think you’re already using what you ought to be using given your needs and wants.
The answer for this lies in research of these tools and the many posts about them here on this forum. The answer also lies in trying them all out for a couple of weeks or a month each to learn it yourself.
But for what you want, Proton VPN is best and I recommend you keep using it.
BitTorrent protocol will only work properly if other peers in the swarm can connect to you from the outside. A VPN places yet another NAT between you and the wider internet, so yet another junction point that needs to be configured to forward the respective port to the device that the BT client is running on. Most VPN providers don’t allow this at all because of security / abuse reasons.
ProtonVPN can do it if your BT client supports UPnP and you have to choose a P2P server. Most do. Windscribe also supports it if you purchase a static IP. There you can choose your port manually so UPnP isn’t needed. Mullvad and IVPN do not allow it at all.
Personally I use Mullvad (in case I use a VPN at all, mostly I do not). I have the least amount of issues with them and servers are fast. If I were to travel to a region with active censorship I would probably use https://obscura.net/ which is just Mullvad servers, but with another relay in front of it that uses QUIC so it shouldn’t get blocked by any censorship middle boxes / firewalls. For BitTorrent usage I only use some VPS in data centers, do not want it on any local box.
I don’t recommend Obscura to most unless you want to test new things. It’s not a mature product and has ways to go before it gets better to a point of being a no nonsense recommendation.
The fact that the VPN jurisdiction is in Canada for Windscribe, Gibraltar for IVPN, is not a downside compared to the EU jurisdiction, like for Mullvad, or Switzerland like for Proton?
I am currently using IVPN on macOS and iOS. ProtonVPN on my Linux desktops that I set up via the terminal with Wireguard with kill-switch enabled, and Mullvad on my Windows machine that I don’t use often.
But I am going to move to ProtonVPN on my Mac as soon as the new upgrade comes out from them and will likely install the same on my new Pixel that I am installing GrapheneOS as we speak.
And I am not concerned about IVPN in any way. I think you may be overthinking this. Best to select any one that PG or Techlore recommends and you’ll be fine.
Do you use ProtonVPN free servers at the moment or do you have a paid subscription? Also if it’s the latter do you use Secure Core servers? Personally for me ProtonVPN has the best speeds compared to Mullvad and IVPN, but you’ll have to try it out yourself really.