The best free VPN services in 2021

[uk666]

The best free VPN services in 2021

If you’re looking for a free VPN service that can take your digital security up a notch, keep your personal data private, and protect your computer or mobile phone from the prying eyes of hackers, this review is especially for you.

There’s no such thing as a free lunch, and that’s never been more true than for free VPNs. In order to profit off of your service, many of them will sell your personal information, or even your web traffic or private IP addresses, to third-party companies.

If you're looking to get maximum security, would always recommend a paid option but for casual browsing a free VPN can be a very useful tool to have at your disposal. it's worth knowing that a paid-for version can cost as little as around $2/£2 per month and will give you much better performance and protection.

The most important things to pay attention to when choosing the right free VPN, are:

1. The level of security it offers
2. Whether its limitations are a deal-breaker for you
3. The level of privacy and the existence of the no-logging policy
4. What kind of information do you have to give up to get access to it.

The best free VPN services in 2021:

1. ProtonVPN Free

Best Free VPN with Unlimited Data Usage

Number of servers: 3
Server locations: 3
Maximum devices supported: 1
Data limit: Unlimited

what sets ProtonVPN apart from the pack is the fact it delivers unlimited data –  this is the only free VPN you really can set and forget without worrying about how much data you're using.

ProtonVPN's zero-logging policy, excellent unlimited data plan, and support for a wide range of devices, plus its functional leak protection, split tunneling and custom DNS servers all combine to make the most well-rounded free VPN we've tested to date by far.

ProtonVPN is well-liked by users because, it benefits from strong laws in its home country of Switzerland that protect your anonymity. This means that it can’t be coerced into spying on you or divulging your information to government surveillance agencies.

2. Windscribe

Best Free VPN for the Security

Number of servers: 10+
Server locations: 10+
Maximum devices supported: 1
Data limit: 10GB per month

You can pick from a selection of servers, including North America, Europe, Hong Kong, and the recently added Turkey. Of course, if you upgrade you'll get a far larger selection, but this is generous for a free VPN.

Windscribe keeps a strict no-logs policy and uses an AES-256 cipher with a 4096-bit RSA key to keep your data safe, and its simple apps make getting started a breeze.

What's interesting is that Windscribe's free VPN has been known to be able to access Netflix. While we can in no way guarantee this as the goalposts are always moving, if you're looking for a free Netflix VPN you could do a lot worse – plus you'll get an ad-blocker, a firewall, and claims of no-logging.

3. TunnelBear Free VPN

Best Free VPN for Beginners

Number of servers: 1,000
Server locations: 20+
Maximum devices supported: 5
Data limit: 500MB per month

TunnelBear is owned by none other than security giant McAfee. The first thing we noticed in our TunnelBear review was the clean, simple app which makes it easy to get going in seconds.

You don't have to fork over too much personal info to sign up – just an email address – and this certainly inspires confidence in the VPN's security. It's great for checking your emails or online banking in privacy.

However, TunnelBear is crippled by its measly 500MB-a-month limit, meaning after a few Facebook videos and emails with attachments you could be nearing your monthly cap.
But, if you're fine with that and want an audited, secure free VPN for very occasional use, TunnelBear is a great option.

4. Hotspot Shield

Best Free VPN for Windows and Mac Users

Number of servers: 1
Server locations: 1
Maximum devices supported: 5
Data limit: 500 MB per day

The data allowance was refreshed every 24 hours, giving us 500 MB of bandwidth to consume every day. That’s about 15 GB per month, provided that we max out our allowance daily.

Most free VPNs generate revenue by injecting ads into the websites we visit, and while Hotspot Shield did that in the past, they recently changed their policy and only placed ads in their mobile apps. 

Also, instead of injecting the ads into websites, Hotspot Shield only showed us short ads after we connected and disconnected our mobile phone VPN. Of course, it’s never fun to see ads, but with a freemium VPN with a generous data usage allowance, going through a couple of ads every session didn’t hurt.

5. Speedify

The free version is the worst for speed

Number of servers: 1000+
Server locations: 50+
Maximum devices supported: 1
Data limit: 10GB per month

a VPN that offers great connection performance across more than 1,000 servers in over 50 countries. You can enjoy a fully encrypted security system while the software's turbo-boosting technology is able to make sure speeds stay at their maximum possible performance.

Speedify allows you 10GB of free data. That's great if you'll be using it for extended period, but you'll have to remember that one it's gone, it's gone.

[aquiladacciaio]

Many thanks 'uk666', I'm looking for a free VPN solution these days.

Someone told me Windscribe is very good: many servers, 10GB per month, but there are some doubts about security due to Windscribe is based in Canada.

What do you think about it, please?

 

And, what about the seed4me VPN? I found a free trial of this, have you heard something about it?

https://www.seed4.me/

Thanks

[uk666]

Windscribe

There's a tiny amount of very minimal long-term logging, but it's limited to the total bandwidth you've used in a month (essential to manage usage on the free plan), and a timestamp of your last activity on the service to allow identifying inactive accounts.

The system does briefly collect some connection details – username, VPN server connected to, time of connection, bandwidth used during the session, number of devices connected – but these are held in the VPN server's RAM only, and are lost when the session closes.

Other than that, there is no logging of connections, IPs, timestamps or browsing history. Or as the privacy policy puts it, 'we do not store any logs on who used what IP address, so we cannot tie user activity to any single user.'

As there is no data on your activities, Windscribe points out that there's nothing to share. This is backed up by a transparency report which covers the numbers of DMCA and Law Enforcement data requests over the year, and in both cases states that: 'Exactly zero requests were complied with due to lack of relevant data.'

Seed4Me

Privacy-wise, there are some concerns but not when it comes to jurisdiction. Seed4Me VPN has a policy of keeping user logs for 7 days.

Good performance at decent speeds, but limited streaming and torrenting capabilities. Seed4Me has trouble unblocking geo-restricted services such as Netflix US and Netflix UK, among others, and it only offers two torrent-capable server locations.

If you can’t overlook some of Seed4Me’s drawbacks, one of the more superior platforms might be the answer you’ve been looking for. 

For example, ExpressVPN has a truly remarkable service although it costs substantially more. NordVPN and CyberGhost are also strong and reliable providers, whereas Surfshark offers more servers and customization options than Seed4.Me and at a lower price.

[bluescope]

I am a great fan of NordVPN which I have been using now for about a year - year 1 of my three-year plan.

But I would be interested to learn UK666's evaluation of the free VPN and Tor services built into the Opera browser or the free Tor and Onion over Tor built into the Brave browser (a Chrome variant and unquestionably the fastest full-featured browser on the planet - only text-based browsers are faster imho). I haven't really looked at Vivaldi yet, but i believe that browser (also Chromium based) is also very fast but doesn't include a built-in VPN or Tor component (?) .

Maz

[koolkat]

A useful, well presented analysis.

ProtonVPN has the significant advantages of having no data limits and keeping no logs.

But note that the free version does not support P2P or torrents, which makes it a non-starter in my case.

For those who do torrenting, this leaves Windscribe as probably the best of the rest, its main disadvantage being the 10GB per month data limit.

[uk666]

@ bluescope. Torrenting over Tor isn't a good idea, the torrent client can still leak your true IP when using Tor as a proxy and Tor is slow…really slow, have you ever tried to stream HD video over Tor? You’ll be very lucky to get 480p resolution.

The trade-off is with free VPN, you won’t get fast speeds, unlimited data, and unrestricted P2P traffic.

You should always use a VPN to protect your IP address when torrenting, so would recommend a paid VPN service.

[BamSec1]

11 hours ago, bluescope said:

a Chrome variant and unquestionably the fastest full-featured browser on the planet

Google Chrome is the most vulnerable browser of all!

I use BitComet with a lifetime VPN when torrenting.
VeePN costed me only $19.99... thanks to our ex-Admin s33m33, who sent me the link to it.

[aquiladacciaio]

Thanks to everyone for the info, in particular to 'uk666' for the clear explanation: I'll try Windscribe.

[FunkyBuddha]

I use ProtonVPN and am very happy with the speed and unlimited bandwidth. I know it says one device, but if you have a router that supports OpenVPN clients, then your whole household could be using VPN. When torrenting, I use NordVPN. Thinking of switching to Proton when I am up for renewal.

[FunkyBuddha]

I finally made the switch to ProtonVPN. No perceptible difference with NordVPN. Two things ProtonVPN have that Nord doesn't: 1- Wireguard native support on router and 2- You can open ports for p2p.