IPVanish VPN

IPVanish offers high-speed connections and an impressive list of advanced security features at a budget-friendly price. Over the years I’ve been working with this VPN, it’s continued to stand out as a reliable option for several different use cases.

My team and I carefully studied its privacy policy and tested its speeds, security features, and streaming capabilities. We also looked into its network coverage and ease of use before putting its customer service team to the test.

Overall, IPVanish is a safe and reliable option with fast speeds and a decent server network. Although it’s had a couple of issues surrounding its privacy standards, it’s taken several steps to mitigate these issues. If you decide to give IPVanish a try, you can take advantage of its 30-day money-back guarantee. If you’re not happy with it, getting a refund is easy.

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Streaming — Great Picture Quality and Short Load Times

IPVanish has greatly improved the number of platforms it works with, supporting HD access from anywhere. During our tests, it worked with nearly every popular streaming service. We were impressed with how it performed, especially when it came to streaming quality.

In fact, it compared favorably with streaming heavyweights such as ExpressVPN and NordVPN.

After extensive testing, we found it compatible with the following platforms:

Works With: Netflix US, UK, Germany, India, and Japan

IPVanish’s servers in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston worked great with Netflix US. Loading times were minimal, and there were no drops in quality for the duration of our testing. We could also safely watch Netflix Germany, Japan, the UK, and India in HD with IPVanish connected.

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In all the regions we tested, we were able to watch the full Netflix library, and weren’t restricted to Netflix Originals. That also included France, the Netherlands, and Canada.

Works With: Hulu

We could safely stream Hulu in HD on all the servers we tested, including Las Angeles, Phoenix, and Seattle. We could stream uninterrupted without encountering any buffering, so there are no complaints about watching this platform.

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Works With: Disney+

We could safely access the different Disney+ regions. We streamed a full episode of Grey’s Anatomy in HD with zero lag on Disney+ UK while connected to one of IPVanish’s London servers. We could also watch Agatha All Along from the US library while connected to Atlanta.

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Works With: Max

Max streamed securely through IPVanish’s New York server. We did have to refresh our browser to get some videos to load, but once running, they played without a hitch. Even with the connection encrypted, Curb Your Enthusiasm still played perfectly.

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Also Works With: BBC iPlayer, ESPN+, and DAZN

UK platforms proved to be no problem, and BBC iPlayer content streamed smoothly. We just had to confirm that we had a TV license, and videos played without lag. We tested servers in Manchester, London, and Birmingham, and all were successful.

ESPN+ and DAZN content also streamed without any issues when connecting to servers in Miami and San Jose.

Doesn’t Work With: Amazon Prime Video

Unfortunately, Amazon Prime Video wouldn’t work with IPVanish. The platform detected the VPN and requested that we disable the connection.

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However, we were still impressed by IPVanish’s performance overall. It’s good to know that the VPN can keep you safe online while allowing you to stream in HD from anywhere.

Speed — Fast on Most Servers

IPVanish is very fast, especially on nearby servers, putting it among some of the fastest VPNs available. The slowdowns were minimal on servers in the same continent. The furthest server on the other side of the world was slower, but that’s usual for most VPNs.

There’s an Optimal Location button, but we didn’t find it to be especially effective. It always connected to a server that wasn’t the fastest, as we found faster ones manually.

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Gaming — Fast Enough Across the Continent

Ping is the all-important metric when it comes to gaming. It measures the latency from your commands to the on-screen action. Under 100 ms is considered optimal for responsive gameplay. With IPVanish, we could get a game-friendly ping from anywhere in Europe. The UK ping of 31 ms was ideal for fast interaction.

Even the New York server, 3,200 miles away from our gaming testing base, was responsive enough at 96 ms. We could easily keep up with all the action on Brawlhalla on a macOS desktop machine.

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Server Network — Large Network of Private Servers

IPVanish has an extensive network of 3,200+ servers in 112 countries, with the US, the UK, Canada, France, and Australia having the most connection options. You can choose city-level servers in many countries too, and there are 142 locations to pick from. It even offers 6 countries in Africa and 11 in South America, which is very rare. Most VPNs neglect these regions, so it’s great to see IPVanish step up in that regard.

You can search for a location or sort servers by country, city, or load to manually select one. Additionally, you can use its interactive map to find a server on the Home tab. Being able to zoom in and out of the map makes it easy to navigate.

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Many VPNs now have RAM-only servers that automatically wipe all user data on reboot, but IPVanish uses hard drive servers. It also doesn’t offer dedicated IP addresses — which are unique to one subscriber. If you need a private IP address, there are a few options available. Still, IPVanish makes up for the lack of these server options with a self-owned network.

Collocated Server Network

IPVanish operates a robust, self-owned (collocated) server network that spans multiple countries worldwide. Most VPNs rent servers from third parties, so this is impressive.

A self-owned server network provides significant privacy advantages compared to VPNs that rely on rented servers. For instance, it allows IPVanish to implement stringent security measures, ensure no third-party access to its hardware, and maintain complete oversight of data handling practices.

Virtual Locations

IPVanish currently has 39 virtual server locations. These can give you the IP address of a location without the server actually being physically located there. Sometimes this is for security reasons. For example, the government of India demands that all commercial servers be monitored. IPVanish, therefore, has a virtual location for India so its users’ privacy isn’t compromised.

Security — Robust Features With Limited Customization

IPVanish is a safe VPN, and one of the main reasons for that is its world-class security features. These features include military-grade encryption, a kill switch, DNS/IP leak protection, split tunneling, and advanced protocols. There’s even a Scramble feature for the OpenVPN protocol, making it look like you’re not using a VPN by obfuscating your traffic. Its main function is to help bypass tough firewalls.

I like that it has its own malware and ad blocker called Threat Protection. It also has a split tunneling feature, which lets you redirect some of your internet traffic through the VPN while the rest uses your regular unencrypted connection.

Military-Grade Encryption

Military-grade encryption, also known as AES 256-bit encryption, is the highest level of encryption available and is very secure. 256 refers to how long the character key is, which protects your data like a password. The longer the character key, the better, as it takes more time to crack it. In fact, 256 bits is so long that it would take several lifetimes for the world’s most powerful supercomputers to break it.

It also uses the SHA512 algorithm for authentication and the DHE-RSA 2048 key exchange that supports perfect forward secrecy. These encryption standards ensure that none of your data can be read even if a hacker gets hold of the decryption key (which is very unlikely, anyway).

Security Protocols — Several Advanced Options

IPVanish provides strong security through several protocols: OpenVPN (TCP and UDP), WireGuard, IKEv2, and IPSec. These protocols allow you to customize your connection for whatever you’re doing online, mainly through speed and security. IPVanish also has an Automatic protocol setting. When you have this enabled, it will choose the best protocol for you based on what you’re doing, so you don’t need to manually select one.

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• OpenVPN. A highly secure open-source protocol. This means that its code is always visible, which allows people to examine and improve it. It offers 2 options: TCP and UDP. TCP provides reliable data delivery but can reduce speeds, while UDP offers faster transmission but may be less reliable.
• WireGuard. A newer protocol that has quickly become the default for many VPNs. It provides a good balance between speed and security. It gave us faster speeds for long-distance connections than any other protocol the VPN offers. It’s also open source, so you can be confident it’s secure. This protocol also has a unique generator in your account portal that makes it easier to do manual configurations for Linux devices and routers.
• IKEv2. A fast protocol that works well on mobile devices. This is because of its ability to auto-connect, which protects you while you switch between a mobile and WiFi network. However, it’s not as fast as OpenVPN or WireGuard.
• IPSec. A safe protocol that provides a framework for secure transport by encrypting IP packets. While it’s predominantly used for security, it still produced decent speeds in our speed tests, coming in as the 3rd fastest.

Overall, the protocol I’d recommend is WireGuard since it offers strong security without compromising your speeds, as was evident in our speed test results.

Kill Switch

IPVanish has a reliable kill switch, and it performed well during my tests. This is a standard feature with VPNs, so I expect to see it. The kill switch cuts off your internet connection if your VPN disconnects temporarily. It is available on most devices, including macOS, Windows, Android, and iOS. It’s kill switch is now offered on Android and Amazon Fire TVs. You rarely see a kill switch developed for televisions, so this makes IPVanish stand out when it comes to smart TV security.

The benefit is that it prevents any accidental exposure of your data. This makes it a handy feature to use on public WiFi networks because hackers can easily intercept your connection if it’s unprotected, even for a minute.

Enabling or disabling the kill switch is very easy on desktops. On Windows, there’s a kill switch check box in the main window, you don’t need to open your settings at all. On macOS, it can be toggled on or off by going to Network Security.

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Threat Protection Ad & Malware Blocker

IPVanish also offers a Threat Protection feature that blocks ads, trackers, and malicious content, so you can browse the web with peace of mind. To test this, I visited various sites known to have pop-ups, such as Forbes and Daily Mail, and IPVanish blocked all pop-up ads. This also made the pages load noticeably quicker.

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Leak Test Results — No Leaks Detected

IPVanish provides both DNS and IP leak protection on all of its apps and worked well during my tests. This ensures that your DNS requests and actual IP address remain hidden, so no one can uncover your browsing activity, location, and identity. These features are already in place, so you don’t have to enable them manually.

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I conducted tests on 6 different servers located in the US, France, Australia, Germany, Japan, and the Netherlands using ipleak.net to check for DNS/IP leaks. The results showed no leaks.

Double Hop VPN

IPVanish now lets you reroute your traffic through 2 servers on Windows, Android, Mac, and iOS apps. This gives you twice the encryption, and IPVanish actually lets you choose any 2 of its servers to accomplish this. Most VPNs only offer a limited number of locations for their equivalent feature. Just be warned, you’ll sacrifice significant speed with double hop, so it’s not recommended for things like streaming.

Privacy — Independently Audited No-Logs Policy

IPVanish has a transparent privacy policy that is outlined on its website. The policy states it only collects payment details and email addresses from customers, which are used to make payments and contact customers when required.

While the company was involved in a dubious privacy scandal in 2016, it has changed ownership and come a long way since then. In March 2022, Leviathan Security Group conducted IPVanish’s first security audit.

Does IPVanish Keep Logs? No

IPVanish follows a no-logs policy. This means it won’t collect or record your data, such as the websites you visit, DNS queries, and connection timestamps. However, it collects random bits of data to help improve its product performance. But since this is anonymously collected, it can’t be traced back to you.

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The collected information includes user language preference, device model, UI interactions, country, and session lengths. Also, you need to provide your email address, name, and payment information when signing up. And since you can’t pay with cryptocurrencies, there’s no way to pay anonymously.

Was IPVanish Audited? Yes

IPVanish has only had 1 third-party audit in its history, which was undertaken by Leviathan Security Group in March 2022. The audit confirmed that IPVanish doesn’t collect user logs or violate any part of its privacy policy, making it trustworthy.

Based in the US

A bigger concern is that IPVanish’s home base is in the US, at the heart of the 14 Eyes Alliance. This is a global surveillance network where member nations share data about their citizens. Plus, they have the power to make third parties hand over this data by law.

In fact, this occurred in 2016 when the FBI requested user data from IPVanish, revealing that the company was retaining user logs. IPVanish complied with the FBI following two requests as part of a criminal investigation. However, IPVanish has updated its privacy policy numerous times since the scandal.

Does IPVanish Work in China? No

IPVanish is unlikely to work in China. The country has blocked all of its servers and IP addresses and access to the IPVanish website. Its obfuscation tool, called Scramble, doesn’t help the VPN work in China and other restrictive nations. The customer service AI confirmed this when I contacted it.

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They also could not confirm that it works in other restrictive countries like Russia, Iran, or Saudi Arabia. While the Chinese government has banned many VPNs, it rarely goes after tourists, as there aren’t any public records of them getting fined. My team and I don’t condone any illegal activities and recommend you read up on the rules and regulations of the country you’re in before choosing to use a VPN.

If you need a VPN for your travels, here are several options that work reliably in China.

Torrenting — Allows P2P Sharing on All Servers

IPVanish is a great option for torrenting since its entire network works for P2P file-sharing. It also has unlimited bandwidth and no data caps, so you can torrent as much as you want for as long as you want.

It is advisable to use a VPN for torrenting as it shields your online identity and location while also encrypting your data. This adds an extra layer of protection against malicious entities. However, it is critical to activate your kill switch in the event of a VPN disconnection.

During our tests, we connected to its US, UK, and New Zealand servers to download a movie on uTorrent. We downloaded Night of the Living Dead on its London server, which took less than a minute to complete. It was a 700MB file, so this was really fast. However, IPVanish lacks port forwarding, which can help you find a larger number of seeders.

IPVanish also offers SOCKS5 proxies in more than 20 locations. You can manually configure this in your BitTorrent client to hide your IP address. Since it doesn’t encrypt your traffic, you’ll get slightly faster speeds for downloading. Our speeds were 5% faster using the proxy address in London as they were using the regular VPN server.

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Even though the proxy offers good speeds, keep in mind that it is less secure since it doesn’t encrypt your data. You can access the full list of SOCKS5 proxy addresses in your IPVanish dashboard and there are guides on its website to help you set it up.

Be aware that many torrents are subject to copyright laws, and we do not endorse any unlawful actions. Before engaging in torrenting, always consult the legal regulations in your jurisdiction and refrain from downloading copyrighted content. Additionally, IPVanish specifies in its Terms of Service that it will deactivate the accounts of users found to be downloading materials protected by copyright.