Do you want to remain anonymous while surfing the web? If yes, then AirVPN could be the ideal solution for you.
While anyone can declare to be distinct these days, when it comes to VPN providers, AirVPN reveals that it really is.
AirVPN stands apart from other VPN services because of its dedication to protecting user privacy. From the start, the AirVPN site starts with an appeal for your trust, mentioning, “A VPN based on OpenVPN and operated by activists and hacktivists in defence of net neutrality, privacy and against censorship”.While anybody can declare to be unique these days, when it pertains to VPN suppliers, AirVPN reveals that it truly is.
They have actually been around a very long time, since 2010, when it was started with the aid of two lawyers and a little group of hackers and activists. The satellite communications supplier Iridium formerly ran it, but AirVPN took over in November 2012. According to the owner’s listing, AirVPN, based in Perugia, is currently owned by Paolo Brini (Italy).
During the last years, it hasn’t been dogged by security scandals like some VPNs have. Nor has it been acquired by a bigger business either.
Throughout their About Us and Mission pages, the company’s history is explained and information the personal privacy projects that AirVPN has actually developed or supported. These include an online encryption tool, a net neutrality monitor, and other projects such as Tor, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and WikiLeaks.
AirVPN takes the non-traditional route and breaks the mold by supplying a VPN designed by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.
So how does AirVPN stack up against its competitors with such strong personal privacy qualifications?
AirVPN’s Key Features
Servers
AirVPN’s network is much smaller sized than many, with only 246 servers spread across 23 countries.
Most servers are in Europe (aside from those in the United States, Canada, and Hong Kong). A minor problem here is that the lack of diversity of servers decreases the number of worldwide AirVPN users who might access geo-restricted services in their home nation while preserving their privacy.
That said, Air is well known for its exceptional performance throughout its server network, with many countries having high-performance physical individual servers.
They use transparent bandwidth allocation techniques to supply a precise assessment of performance, with no overbooking or overselling. Plus, they are completely unlimited, with no speed restrictions or time limits.
To establish a connection between your machine and their servers, they utilize OpenVPN and WireGuard (in beta). OpenVPN is the most protected and reliable method to create encrypted tunnels. It provides more security than the military.
Many ports and protocols are offered; they use OpenVPN on the following ports: 80 TCP/UDP, 443 TCP/UDP, and 53 TCP/UDP. Every Air server directly supports OpenVPN over SSH, OpenVPN over SSL, and OpenVPN over Tor. So forget about PPTP and other hazardous protocols.
No preference is given to any service, protocol, or application when it comes down to it. Net Neutrality is upheld. Importantly, you can overcome internet restrictions such as avoiding censorship, geographic restrictions, and traffic shaping.
The use is OpenVPN is a huge plus as it automatically improves users’ personal privacy and security and is highly trustworthy. Nevertheless, the lack of WireGuard as standard may show Air isn’t quite keeping up with its competitors. That said, AirVPN says it is testing WireGuard, but it won’t put the more recent protocol fully in place till some of its technical and personal privacy problems are resolved.
AirVPN has likewise included a lot for power users and tech-savvy individuals who like to try out things.
Switching is limitless, so if you do not like one server, you can easily switch servers as often as you like.
You can monitor the existing load on each server, any existing problems, and a history of previous issues on AirVPN’s network status page (which opens in a brand-new tab).
There is a comprehensive specs page for AirVPN’s servers, with info like the offered ports, protocols, DNS server information (AirVPN has its own DNS server), and the IP addresses of each VPN server’s access points.
All of it is nice, but since there is no third-party audit, you need to rely on that what is being used will work. Looking at the active community forum or the comprehensive open-source clients puts your mind at ease.
A great aspect of this is that you can see what other people state about the service prior to signing up. You don’t need to take their word for it or the word of an audit.
Just How Private Is AirVPN, & Does It Keep Logs?
When it concerns AirVPN’s no-logging policy, the company is very clear. Online privacy and security are the outright top priority, with security from snoopers, data miners, and other entities that invade privacy. There is no individual information logged by AirVPN, which has a strong no-logging, tracking, or monitoring policy.
AirVPN doesn’t track what you do when you’re connected to the VPN, date/time stamps, or your IP address. It just collects non-identifiable “technical data” to keep the server running and enhance services, however you can request this info to be erased at any time. This makes it one of the most privacy-friendly VPN services.
As a result, nobody can identify you online; not even your ISP can figure out what kind of traffic or protocol you’re using.
There’s no listening in, so you can connect to any wi-fi network without worrying about your computer system and the Wi-Fi hotspot spying on your information.
Even the most ruthless surveillance, censoring, throttling, and traffic shaping tactics will fail versus AirVPN due to the fact that your ISP and government will just see TCP or UDP communication on a single port.
They also say they follow EU privacy policies and that any servers outside the EU will be treated with the very same or greater levels of personal privacy and data protection as those in the EU.
You can get a brand-new IP address to hide your IP so that nobody can use it to find out who you are. You’ll remain safe with the high-level protection provided.
You can still connect to an AirVPN server through OpenVPN over SSH, SSL, or Tor if your ISP or nation blocks OpenVPN.
Open-source clients and a lively community online forum allow you to get a sense of what existing users are saying about the service prior to signing up.
All of AirVPN’s software is open-source, which is a big plus. This means that anyone can check out AirVPN’s security. ProtonVPN, Private Internet Access, and Mullvad VPN have open-source apps, however only ProtonVPN’s apps have actually been inspected by a 3rd party.
Concerning security, AirVPN’s cryptography is arguably the very best readily available. It’s similar to that of some other providers, but still worth pointing out. The very first exchange utilizes 4096-bit RSA to attain Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS) by means of Diffie-Hellman key exchange. Following the first key negotiation, re-keying occurs every 60 minutes, and the user can decrease this value. The main information channel utilizes AES-256-CBC encryption.
When creating an account, you are not required to input any personal details, not even your real e-mail address. That’s excellent considering that it lets you avoid leaving any sort of digital footprint. But know that you won’t be able to alter your account’s password if you don’t utilize one.
Italy, where AirVPN is based, is a member of the 5/9/14 Eyes Alliances (a group of countries that share intelligence data). Even if the government asked for user information, AirVPN would have absolutely nothing to provide them.
Who Or What Is Eddie??
The Eddie UI is the name of AirVPN’s main open-source application, offered on all significant platforms and OSes, consisting of Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Regrettably, in spite of Eddie’s considerable ability with OpenVPN, it does not yet support WireGuard, so performance isn’t quite as good as those suppliers who utilize it as standard.
Setting up the app is simple, and it has all the information you need to connect to a VPN.
There are no maps or clearly indicated buttons to guide you. While it’s not hard to get things working, it doesn’t have the most easy to use user interface, so it might be a more difficult learning curve for inexperienced users.
With Windows, there are a load of download options. There are builds for numerous operating systems (from Windows XP to Windows 11), in 32- and 64-bit flavors, and in installable or portable formats. In addition, there’s a changelog to explain what’s new and an archive of past releases in case the most present does not function on your setup.
After introducing it, choose ‘Connect to a recommended server,’ and the app will connect to your closest location. When you’re ended up, you simply click Disconnect. Simple enough for anybody, but Eddie can do a lot more given that AirVPN uses more fine-tuned complete control over operations than any other VPN app we’ve seen.
2 key AirVPN features through Eddie are its auto-connect and kill switch. AirVPN enables you to connect when your computer launches, however you can’t pick which VPN server it will connect to; it will always connect to the one you selected last.
Even though it specifies “kill switch” anywhere in the settings, AirVPN has a tab called “network lock” that does the exact same thing. The distinction is that AirVPN’s “network lock” stops all traffic that isn’t going through its safe tunnel. A lot of standard kill switches only do this when the VPN is on, however you can establish the “network lock” to filter your traffic at all times.
Eddie’s layout is easy to understand. Along the top, there are six tabs: Overview, Servers, Countries, Speed, Stats, and Logs.
The Overview merely shows the server to which you are connected, the download and upload speeds, the exit IP address, and the connection time. This is where you log into your account.
The Servers page shows all readily available servers in the network, together with detailed info about each one, such as the server’s nickname, location, latency in milliseconds from your area, and existing users and server load. Impressive stuff!
This tab likewise has an amber/green signal that lets you know whether a server is suggested for you.
The Countries page displays the number of servers offered in each nation at a glance, together with a sign of server load and user numbers. Just like the Servers page, the amber/green indicator is also revealed. Lots of servers have up to 1000 Mb/s bandwidth, while some smaller ones have a 100 Mb/s connection.
A green checkmark, a red “X,” and a blank box can be discovered on the right rail of the Countries tab. Highlight a nation, click the green checkmark, and the servers for that nation will appear on the Servers tab. This whitelist is essentially a favorites list; you might pick as many nations as you like.
If you click the red “x”, that nation will be eliminated, successfully making it a blocklist/denylist. To remove the green checkmark from a country, click the empty box.
By selecting a nation, you are not instantly connected to a VPN server. Connect to a server by marking it and clicking on the “sign out” icon on the right-hand side (a right-facing arrow pointing into a square bracket).
The Speed tab displays an easy throughput graph with thin plot lines. Its temporal resolution can be changed, so you can see traffic from the last 10 seconds to one day.
While many apps show your current VPN server location and IP address at most. Eddie’s Stats page also reveals fine-grained details, such as the server’s location, load, present user count, protocol, port, encryption algorithm, session start time and length, IPv6 exit address, data downloaded and uploaded, and much more.
Power users, in particular, should value the ability to use a VPN with all the info they could ever want about the various locations, down to the variety of users on a particular server. It’s a priceless resource.
Lastly, Logs is an in-depth record of connections, routes, and other information.
This permits you to fine-tune the setup, such as whether it should constantly connect when opened, which protocol to use between UDP and TCP, and which port number. Proxies, Tor assistance, custom DNS servers, and routes can be modified.
The really experienced user can go into Advanced and Expert Mode settings, which permit, to name a few things, sending orders to the OpenVPN Management Interface via the Logs pane.
If the huge function list appears frightening, even if you are a VPN expert, it might be hard to figure out what specific settings do and how to get the wanted results. In addition, it is unlike any other service in regards to personalization.
Don’t dismiss AirVPN’s Eddie simply since of its intricacy. Remember that the program usually operates fine by itself, and you’ll never ever see the settings until you look for them. However, if you occasionally yearn for power or configurability, the app will provide it.
Suppose you do not wish to utilize Eddie. In that case, you can also set up a router or firewall to send all traffic through a VPN tunnel. This works with routers running the open-source DD-WRT and Tomato firmware and the FreeBSD-based pfSense firewall.
How Good Is AirVPN’s Mobile App?
Although there isn’t any VPN software for iOS, you can utilize an extremely feature-rich Android VPN app instead. This software application supplies the same comprehensive setup choices as its desktop sibling and helpful status info.
Separate pages for nation and server lists are what the Android app lacks that the desktop versions provides. Rather, you can expand a country and choose a particular city on the exact same page. Some handy text additions make the details more understandable, however it’s still quite challenging to understand in some spots.
Android does not have as many settings as Windows. That’s not a significant critique; there are still a lot more than most people will ever need. The software also attempts a little more to help you, with extra text subtitles to explain what each alternative does.
Speeds/Performance
Using OpenVPN, the Eddie Windows app from AirVPN generally connects rapidly and is ready to enter less than 10 seconds.
Online reviewers felt the connection monitoring was great, with the app discovering when the VPN tunnel drops, notifying us with a desktop notification, and reconnecting us in seconds.
In regards to privacy, leak tests showed that AirVPN’s Windows client didn’t have any DNS leaks, which reveals that the Network Lock/Kill Switch works well.
Now let’s get to those speeds.
It was always going to be slower than the WireGuard-equipped competitors due to the fact that AirVPN just supports OpenVPN.
Nevertheless, reviewers have actually reported speeds to be outstanding. Certainly, one said there wasn’t a single country where they might complain about the speed. On the contrary, it was really remarkable overall.
While it wasn’t rather at the top tier for VPNs that utilize WireGuard, it was still more than fast enough for most people, and circumstances like HD streaming, gaming, and video conferencing definitely won’t slow you down.
What AirVPN lacks is a wider variety of server areas. This might restrict the availability of close-by servers for some users (which will constantly lead to better speeds). As a result, this VPN is an outstanding choice for the majority of people in the United States and Europe, but perhaps less so for other regions.
Streaming
Streaming the big services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple Television, Hulu, HBO, BBC iPlayer, and Discovery+ has been a mixed bag for reviewers. Some report that AirVPN is effective enough to bypass the VPN blocks utilized by Netflix in the USA, whereas others do not.
Indeed, some report that Air is pretty bad for streaming and doesn’t work with any of the major streaming services. It appears to work with less-popular streaming apps like Peacock and Sony Crackle.
Another reviewer states services like BBC iPlayer and United States Netflix rarely work, and when they do, discovering the right server requires lengthy experimentation. This is most likely due to the fact that, unlike other service providers, AirVPN does not use servers that are optimised for accessing streaming websites.
Luckily, on AirVPN’s website, there is a list of ‘blocked websites’ that users can inspect to see if the situation with these streaming sites ever changes.
Streaming is definitely not an area in which AirVPN stands out, simply since that’s not what the service is about, as they are more focused on personal privacy and security.
Does AirVPN Allow Torrenting?
Yes, it does; every web protocol, consisting of peer-to-peer, is welcome. Undoubtedly, Air supports P2P file-sharing on all of its servers. There’s nothing to set up, no hoops to jump through. Just connect to the VPN server of your option and start.
Plus, you can use port forwarding to enhance your file-sharing performance. Numerous applications, such as BitTorrent and eMule clients, would run badly without it, and your computer’s shares might be inaccessible from the Internet.
File sharing has good speeds on regional servers, enables port forwarding for up to 20 ports simultaneously (which lets you connect to more peers for faster speeds), and works with top torrenting clients like qBitTorrent and uTorrent.
AirVPN’s built-in kill switch, activated by default, will block all traffic from exiting your device if the VPN connection ever drops. That way, you will not be sending unencrypted packets to the Web. If you are file sharing, a kill switch is really convenient, especially if you need to leave your connection unattended.
Reviewers have actually revealed torrenting to be remarkable, smooth running with quick download and upload speeds, and with no concerns whatsoever.
AirVPN Plans & Rates
AirVPN provides a wider range of plans than most VPNs. As standard, each plan lets you connect up to 5 devices simultaneously, so you can connect your PC, phone, tablet, and a couple of other devices all at the same time.
This makes it an exceptional option for people who reside in a household house or wish to use a VPN on a public network. While five should suffice for most people, other VPN providers provide 7 or even 10 if you require more.
Prices differs based on the subscription length, and each plan includes the same features. The majority of plans use good value; however, longer memberships provide the best deal.
The standard pricing is in Euros. Nevertheless, they use the European Central Bank to offer real-time exchange rates for those overseas, so it can be easily transformed to and paid for in the currency of your choice.
The present plans available are:
Three days- EUR2
One month – EUR7
Three months – EUR15 – works out to EUR 5/month
Six months – EUR29 – works out to EUR 4.83/month
One year – EUR49 – works out to EUR 4.08/month
Two years – EUR79 – works out to EUR 3.29/month
Three years – EUR99 – works out to EUR 2.75/month
AirVPN accepts major credit cards, PayPal, Amazon Pay, and a whole load of cryptocurrencies, consisting of Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Doge. Lots of worldwide choices are also accepted, such as Alipay and Giropay.
AirVPN offers a three-day totally free trial, which can be obtained by sending out a message to the support team and using the discount coupon code they send you.
There’s likewise a 30-day money-back guarantee, as long as they haven’t broken the terms of service or used more than 5 GB of data throughout that time.
AirVPN Customer Support
AirVPN has a different customer assistance offering than numerous other VPNs. While it does not have live chat, it uses email support and frequently asked questions (Frequently asked questions) and has a really active support online forum with contributors from both the service itself and the community.
Significantly, AirVPN’s e-mail assistance isn’t outsourced however can be a little irregular with the time it takes to get an action. That said, the e-mail support is high quality, and the representatives are friendly and useful, but the detailed answers can be quite technical, which may put off those new to VPNs.
AirVPN’s site has a lot of info, including a big Frequently asked questions area that is broken up by subject.
AirVPN’s community forums cover various subjects, however newbies will have the exact same troubles understanding a lot of the tech lingo in the posts.
AirVPN Pros & Cons
Pros:
No logging Whatsoever.
Outstanding speeds with minimal loss.
Unlimited P2P allowed with Port Forwarding.
Strong security on apps and servers alike, with advanced protocols and encryption.
Network Lock/Kill Switch.
Split tunneling.
Supports Windows, Mac, Linux, mobile, and routers.
Supports Tor over VPN.
Easy app setup and usage.
Many, many advanced settings and customization choices in the client app.
Solid Customer Service.
Active Community Forums and In-depth Guides.
Good costs, especially for longer-term plans.
Optional block lists shield you from advertisements, adware, trackers, and damaging sources.
Cons:
Only fully supports OpenVPN.
Client app isn’t very easy to use or attractive like other services.
Client app might overwhelm newer users.
It is very hit and miss with streaming services.
No native iOS or ChromeOS apps.
Perhaps there are a lot of advanced choices.
Located in 14-Eyes Country.
Server numbers are fairly low.
Rounding Things Up – Is AirVPN The Very Best Choice?
So the bottom line is that AirVPN is a strong, reputable, and safe VPN service with great prices. It’s clearly geared towards more power and advanced users, so those new to VPNs will be much better served by a less, shall we say, specialized VPN provider. However even brand-new users might do much, much worse.
While it could be challenging to utilize if you’re brand-new to VPNs, you’ll get much quicker speeds and much better results than a number of its competing VPN competitors.
When it comes down to it, this VPN service is more focused on securing your personal privacy than unblocking streaming services like Netflix or Hulu.
Although it may not guarantee the very same level of privacy and anonymity as a service like Mullvad, which assigns you a random account number and allows you to pay in cash, AirVPN is still an excellent alternative for consumers who value their personal privacy.
While it doesn’t hit the speed heights of a WireGuard service, performance-wise, it’s absolutely the very best purely OpenVPN service out there. In addition to being an excellent option for online filesharing.
Highly recommended!