AirVPN Review: Is It Even Better Than FastVPN?

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Do you wish to stay anonymous while surfing the web? If yes, then AirVPN could be the perfect option for you.

While anybody can declare to be unique these days, when it concerns VPN suppliers, AirVPN reveals that it genuinely is.

AirVPN stands out from other VPN services because of its commitment to securing user privacy. Right from the start, the AirVPN website starts with an appeal for your trust, specifying, “A VPN based on OpenVPN and operated by activists and hacktivists in defence of net neutrality, privacy and against censorship”.While anyone can claim to be unique nowadays, when it pertains to VPN companies, AirVPN reveals that it truly is.

AirVPN Home Page

They have actually been around a very long time, since 2010, when it was started with the aid of two lawyers and a small group of hackers and activists. The satellite communications provider Iridium previously ran it, however AirVPN took control of in November 2012. According to the owner’s listing, AirVPN, based in Perugia, is presently 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 company either.

Throughout their About Us and Mission pages, the business’s history is explained and details the personal privacy projects that AirVPN has 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 unconventional route and breaks the mold by offering a VPN designed by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.

How does AirVPN stack up versus its rivals with such strong personal privacy qualifications?

AirVPN’s Key Features

Servers

AirVPN’s network is much smaller than many, with just 246 servers spread out across 23 nations.

The majority of servers are in Europe (besides those in the US, Canada, and Hong Kong). A small concern here is that the absence of variety of servers decreases the number of international AirVPN users who might access geo-restricted services in their home country while maintaining their personal privacy.

AirVPN Servers

That stated, Air is well known for its outstanding performance across its server network, with many countries having high-performance physical individual servers.

They utilize transparent bandwidth allocation strategies to supply an accurate evaluation of performance, with no overbooking or overselling. Plus, they are totally 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 reliable and protected way to create encrypted tunnels. It uses more security than the military.

Many ports and protocols are readily available; they use OpenVPN on the following ports: 80 TCP/UDP, 443 TCP/UDP, and 53 TCP/UDP. Additionally, every Air server directly supports OpenVPN over SSH, OpenVPN over SSL, and OpenVPN over Tor. Forget about PPTP and other unsafe protocols.

No choice is given to any protocol, service, or application when it comes down to it. Net Neutrality is maintained. Importantly, you can overcome internet restrictions such as avoiding censorship, geographical restrictions, and traffic shaping.

The use is OpenVPN is a huge plus as it instantly improves users’ privacy and security and is extremely dependable. Nevertheless, the absence of WireGuard as standard might show Air isn’t quite keeping up with its competitors. That said, AirVPN states it is testing WireGuard, however it won’t put the newer protocol fully in place up until some of its technical and privacy issues are addressed.

AirVPN has also included a lot for power users and tech-savvy people who like to try out things.

Switching is limitless, so if you don’t like one server, you can quickly change servers as often as you like.

You can monitor the current load on each server, any existing issues, and a history of previous problems on AirVPN’s network status page (which opens in a brand-new tab).

There is an in-depth specifications page for AirVPN’s servers, with information like the readily available ports, protocols, DNS server info (AirVPN has its own DNS server), and the IP addresses of each VPN server’s access points.

All of it is nice, but given that there is no third-party audit, you have to rely on that what is being used will work. Looking at the active community forum or the in-depth open-source clients puts your mind at ease.

A nice thing about this is that you can see what other individuals say about the service before registering. You don’t have to take their word for it or the word of an audit.

Just How Private Is AirVPN, & Does It Keep Logs?

When it comes to AirVPN’s no-logging policy, the company is extremely clear. Online privacy and security are the absolute top priority, with defense from snoopers, data miners, and other entities that invade privacy. There is no individual info logged by AirVPN, which has a strong no-logging, tracking, or monitoring policy.

AirVPN does not track what you do when you’re connected to the VPN, date/time stamps, or your IP address. It only gathers non-identifiable “technical information” to keep the server running and enhance services, however you can request this information to be erased at any time. This makes it among the most privacy-friendly VPN services.

As a result, nobody can identify you online; not even your ISP can determine what type of traffic or protocol you’re utilizing.

There’s no listening in, so you can connect to any wi-fi network without worrying about your computer and the Wi-Fi hotspot spying on your data.

Even the most ruthless surveillance, censoring, throttling, and traffic shaping tactics will fail against AirVPN since your ISP and government will only see TCP or UDP communication on a single port.

They likewise state they comply with EU privacy policies and that any servers outside the EU will be treated with the very same or greater levels of personal privacy and information protection as those in the EU.

You can get a new IP address to conceal your IP so that no one can utilize it to discover who you are. You’ll remain safe with the high-level security provided.

You can still connect to an AirVPN server through OpenVPN over SSH, SSL, or Tor if your ISP or nation obstructs OpenVPN.

Open-source clients and a lively community forum allow you to get a sense of what current users are saying about the service prior to registering.

All of AirVPN’s software is open-source, which is a huge plus. This suggests that anyone can look into AirVPN’s security. ProtonVPN, Private Internet Access, and Mullvad VPN have open-source apps, however only ProtonVPN’s apps have actually been checked by a third party.

Relating to security, AirVPN’s cryptography is arguably the best offered. It’s similar to that of some other companies, however still worth mentioning. The first exchange utilizes 4096-bit RSA to accomplish 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 reduce this value. The main information channel employs AES-256-CBC encryption.

When creating an account, you are not required to input any personal info, not even your real email address. That’s terrific because it lets you prevent leaving any sort of digital footprint. Be conscious that you will not be able to alter your account’s password if you do not utilize one.

Italy, where AirVPN is based, belongs to the 5/9/14 Eyes Alliances (a group of nations that share intelligence information). But even if the federal government requested for user info, AirVPN would have absolutely nothing to provide.

Who Or What Is Eddie??

The Eddie UI is the name of AirVPN’s primary open-source application, offered on all major platforms and OSes, consisting of Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Unfortunately, in spite of Eddie’s significant ability with OpenVPN, it does not yet support WireGuard, so performance isn’t quite as good as those providers who utilize it as standard.

AirVPN Eddie Overview

Establishing the app is simple, and it has all the information you require to connect to a VPN.

Unfortunately, there are no maps or clearly indicated buttons to guide you. While it’s not tough to get things working, it does not have the most user-friendly interface, so it may be a more challenging learning curve for unskilled users.

With Windows, there are a heap of download options. There are builds for different operating systems (from Windows XP to Windows 11), in 32- and 64-bit flavors, and in portable or installable formats. In addition, there’s a changelog to discuss what’s brand-new and an archive of past releases in case the most existing doesn’t work on your setup.

After launching it, select ‘Connect to a recommended server,’ and the app will connect to your closest area. When you’re completed, you simply click Disconnect. Simple enough for anybody, however Eddie can do a lot more since AirVPN uses more fine-tuned complete control over operations than any other VPN app we’ve seen.

AirVPN Eddie Servers List

Two key AirVPN functions through Eddie are its auto-connect and kill switch. AirVPN allows you to connect when your computer system launches, however you can’t select which VPN server it will connect to; it will always connect to the one you selected last.

Even though it defines “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. Many basic kill switches just do this when the VPN is on, but you can set up the “network lock” to filter your traffic at all times.

Eddie’s design is easy to understand. Along the top, there are six tabs: Overview, Servers, Countries, Speed, Stats, and Logs.

The Overview just displays 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 offered servers in the network, along with detailed details about every one, such as the server’s label, place, latency in milliseconds from your area, and current users and server load. Impressive stuff!

This tab also has an amber/green signal that lets you know whether a server is suggested for you.

The Countries page shows the variety of servers offered in each nation at a look, together with an indicator of server load and user numbers. Just like the Servers page, the amber/green indicator is also shown. 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 country will appear on the Servers tab. This whitelist is basically a favorites list; you may select as numerous nations as you like.

If you click the red “x”, that country will be eliminated, efficiently making it a blocklist/denylist. To eliminate the green checkmark from a nation, click the empty box.

By picking a nation, you are not immediately 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 a basic throughput graph with thin plot lines. Its temporal resolution can be altered, so you can see traffic from the last 10 seconds to one day.

While the majority of apps display your existing 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 uploaded and downloaded, and a lot more.

Power users, in particular, should value the ability to use a VPN with all the info they might ever desire about the different locations, down to the number of users on a particular server. It’s a valuable resource.

Logs is a comprehensive record of connections, routes, and other data.

A million and one other settings are hidden in the app’s Settings menu. This allows you to tweak the setup, such as whether it should always connect when opened, which protocol to utilize between UDP and TCP, and which port number. Or whether to try an SSH tunnel via more flexible ports such as 22, 80, and 443. Proxies, Tor assistance, custom DNS servers, and routes can be modified.

The truly experienced user can enter into Advanced and Expert Mode settings, which enable, to name a few things, sending orders to the OpenVPN Management User Interface through the Logs pane.

If the vast feature list appears scary, even if you are a VPN specialist, it might be hard to figure out what particular settings do and how to get the desired results. In addition, it differs from any other service in regards to personalization.

However, do not dismiss AirVPN’s Eddie just because of its intricacy. Bear in mind that the program normally functions fine by itself, and you’ll never ever see the settings till you look for them. If you occasionally yearn for power or configurability, the app will supply it.

AirVPN Software Configurations

Suppose you do not wish to use Eddie. In that case, you can also set up a router or firewall to send out 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?

There isn’t any VPN software for iOS, you can use an extremely feature-rich Android VPN app rather. This software application provides the very same substantial configuration options as its desktop sibling and handy status information.

Different pages for country and server lists are what the Android app lacks that the desktop versions provides. Instead, you can expand a country and select a particular city on the very same page. Some valuable text additions make the details more easy to understand, however it’s still quite challenging to comprehend in some spots.

Android does not have as lots of settings as Windows. That’s not a significant critique; there are still much more than most people will ever need. The software application also attempts a little bit more to help you, with extra text subtitles to describe what each alternative does.

Speeds/Performance

Using OpenVPN, the Eddie Windows app from AirVPN typically connects quickly and is ready to go in less than 10 seconds.

Online reviewers felt the connection monitoring was good, with the app detecting when the VPN tunnel drops, alerting us with a desktop notice, and reconnecting us in seconds.

In terms of privacy, leak tests revealed 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 since AirVPN only supports OpenVPN.

Reviewers have reported speeds to be exceptional. Certainly, one said there wasn’t a single nation where they could grumble about the speed. On the contrary, it was truly outstanding overall.

While it wasn’t rather at the top tier for VPNs that use WireGuard, it was still more than fast enough for many people, and situations like HD video, streaming, and gaming conferencing certainly will not slow you down.

What AirVPN does not have is a broader number of server locations. This might limit the ease of access of neighboring servers for some users (which will always result in much better speeds). As a result, this VPN is an outstanding choice for many people in the United States and Europe, but maybe less so for other regions.

Streaming

Streaming the huge services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV, Hulu, HBO, BBC iPlayer, and Discovery+ has been a mixed bag for reviewers. Some report that AirVPN is powerful enough to bypass the VPN blocks used by Netflix in the USA, whereas others do not.

Some report that Air is pretty bad for streaming and does not work with any of the major streaming services. However, it appears to deal with less-popular streaming apps like Peacock and Sony Crackle.

Another reviewer states services like BBC iPlayer and United States Netflix seldom work, and when they do, finding the best server needs prolonged trial and error. This is most likely since, unlike other service providers, AirVPN does not use servers that are optimised for accessing streaming sites.

Luckily, on AirVPN’s website, there is a list of ‘blocked websites’ that users can check to see if the situation with these streaming websites ever changes.

However, streaming is certainly not an area in which AirVPN stands out, simply because that’s not what the service is about, as they are more focused on personal privacy and security.

Does AirVPN Allow P2P?

Air supports P2P file-sharing on all of its servers. Merely connect to the VPN server of your choice and get going.

Plus, you can use port forwarding to improve your file-sharing performance. A number of applications, such as BitTorrent and eMule clients, would run poorly without it, and your computer’s shares might be inaccessible from the Internet.

File sharing has good speeds on local servers, enables port forwarding for up to 20 ports simultaneously (which lets you connect to more peers for faster speeds), and works with leading torrenting clients like qBitTorrent and uTorrent.

AirVPN’s built-in kill switch, triggered by default, will block all traffic from exiting your gadget if the VPN connection ever drops. That way, you won’t be sending unencrypted packets to the Internet. If you are file sharing, a kill switch is really convenient, especially if you need to leave your connection unattended.

Reviewers have revealed torrenting to be impressive, smooth running with fast download and upload speeds, and without any issues whatsoever.

AirVPN Plans & Prices

AirVPN offers a broader range of plans than a lot of VPNs. As standard, each plan lets you connect up to 5 gadgets concurrently, so you can connect your PC, phone, tablet, and a couple of other gadgets all at the same time.

This makes it an exceptional option for people who reside in a family home or wish to use a VPN on a public network. While five should suffice for most people, other VPN service providers offer 7 or even 10 if you require more.

Prices varies based upon the membership length, and each plan includes the exact same features. The majority of plans offer good value; nevertheless, longer subscriptions offer the very best deal.

The standard pricing is in Euros. Nevertheless, they utilize the European Central Bank to provide real-time currency exchange rate for those overseas, so it can be easily transformed to and spent for in the currency of your choice.

The existing 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 international choices are also accepted, such as Alipay and Giropay.

AirVPN offers a three-day free trial, which can be obtained by sending a message to the support team and using the voucher 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 during that time.

AirVPN Customer Assistance

AirVPN has a different customer support offering than lots of other VPNs. While it does not have live chat, it uses e-mail assistance and frequently asked questions (Frequently asked questions) and has an extremely active assistance forum with contributors from both the service itself and the community.

Significantly, AirVPN’s email assistance isn’t outsourced but can be a little irregular with the time it takes to get a response. That stated, the email support is high quality, and the representatives are handy and friendly, but the extensive responses can be pretty technical, which might put off those new to VPNs.

AirVPN’s site has a great deal of information, consisting of a large Frequently asked questions section that is separated by subject.

AirVPN’s community forums cover several subjects, however newbies will have the exact same problems comprehending a great deal 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 options in the client app.

Solid Client Service.

Active Community Online Forums and Detailed Guides.

Great costs, especially for longer-term plans.

Optional block lists protect you from ads, adware, trackers, and harmful sources.

Cons:

Only fully supports OpenVPN.

Client app isn’t very user-friendly or pretty like other services.

Client app may overwhelm more recent users.

It is really hit and miss with streaming services.

No native iOS or ChromeOS apps.

Possibly there are a lot of advanced options.

Found in 14-Eyes Country.

Server numbers are relatively low.

Rounding Things Up – Is AirVPN The Best Option?

The bottom line is that AirVPN is a strong, reliable, and safe VPN service with great prices. It’s plainly tailored towards more power and advanced users, so those new to VPNs will be much better served by a less, shall we say, specialized VPN service provider. But 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 better results than a lot of its rival VPN rivals.

When it boils down to it, this VPN service is more concentrated on protecting your privacy than unblocking streaming services like Netflix or Hulu.

It might not guarantee the exact same level of personal privacy and privacy as a service like Mullvad, which appoints you a random account number and allows you to pay in cash, AirVPN is still a good choice for customers who value their privacy.

While it does not hit the speed heights of a WireGuard service, performance-wise, it’s definitely the very best purely OpenVPN service out there. In addition to being an excellent choice for online filesharing.

Highly recommended!

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