AirVPN Vs TunnelBear: 5 Tests To Decide “Who’s Top” In 2022?

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Do you wish to remain anonymous while surfing the web? AirVPN might be the ideal service for you if yes.

While anyone can claim to be unique these days, when it comes to VPN service providers, AirVPN shows that it truly is.

AirVPN sticks out from other VPN services because of its dedication to protecting user privacy. Right from the start, the AirVPN website starts with an appeal for your trust, stating, “A VPN based on OpenVPN and operated by activists and hacktivists in defence of net neutrality, privacy and against censorship”.While anybody can claim to be special nowadays, when it pertains to VPN providers, AirVPN shows that it truly is.

AirVPN Home Page

They have actually been around a 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 previously ran it, however AirVPN took control of 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.

Across their About Us and Mission pages, the business’s history is explained and details the privacy projects that AirVPN has actually developed or supported. These consist of 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 providing a VPN developed by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.

How does AirVPN stack up against its competitors with such strong privacy credentials?

AirVPN’s Key Features

Servers

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

Many servers are in Europe (other than those in the US, Canada, and Hong Kong). A small issue here is that the lack of diversity of servers decreases the number of international AirVPN users who may access geo-restricted services in their home country while maintaining their personal privacy.

AirVPN Servers

That said, Air is popular for its impressive performance throughout its server network, with numerous nations having high-performance physical individual servers.

They utilize transparent bandwidth allocation methods to provide an accurate evaluation of performance, without any overbooking or overselling. Plus, they are entirely unlimited, with no speed restrictions or time limits.

To establish a connection between your machine and their servers, they use OpenVPN and WireGuard (in beta). OpenVPN is the most dependable and safe method to create encrypted tunnels. It uses more security than the military.

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

When it boils down to it, no choice is given to any service, application, or protocol. Net Neutrality is upheld. Importantly, you can get rid of internet constraints such as avoiding censorship, geographic restrictions, and traffic shaping.

The usage is OpenVPN is a big plus as it instantly improves users’ personal privacy and security and is highly trustworthy. Nevertheless, the absence of WireGuard as standard may reveal Air isn’t rather keeping up with its rivals. That said, AirVPN says it is evaluating WireGuard, but it will not put the more recent protocol completely in place till some of its technical and personal privacy problems are addressed.

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

Switching is limitless, so if you do not like one server, you can easily switch servers as frequently as you like.

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

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

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

A nice feature of 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 business is extremely clear. Online privacy and security are the outright top priority, with protection from snoopers, data miners, and other entities that attack privacy. There is no individual info 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 only gathers non-identifiable “technical information” to keep the server running and enhance services, but you can request for this details to be deleted 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 figure out what kind of traffic or protocol you’re utilizing.

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

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

They also 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 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 use it to find out who you are. You’ll remain safe with the top-level protection offered.

If your ISP or country blocks OpenVPN, you can still connect to an AirVPN server through OpenVPN over SSH, SSL, or Tor.

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

All of AirVPN’s software is open-source, which is a huge plus. This indicates that anybody can check out AirVPN’s security. ProtonVPN, Private Internet Access, and Mullvad VPN have open-source apps, but only ProtonVPN’s apps have actually been inspected by a 3rd party.

Regarding security, AirVPN’s cryptography is arguably the best offered. The first exchange utilizes 4096-bit RSA to accomplish Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS) by means of Diffie-Hellman key exchange.

When creating an account, you are not required to input any personal information, not even your genuine e-mail address. That’s great because it lets you prevent leaving any sort of digital footprint. Be conscious that you will not be able to change 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 information). But even if the federal government requested user information, AirVPN would have nothing to provide.

Who Or What Is Eddie??

The Eddie UI is the name of AirVPN’s main open-source application, available on all major platforms and OSes, including Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. In spite of Eddie’s substantial capability with OpenVPN, it does not yet support WireGuard, so performance isn’t rather as good as those companies who use it as requirement.

AirVPN Eddie Overview

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

Unfortunately, there are no maps or clearly indicated buttons to direct you. While it’s not hard to get things working, it doesn’t have the most user-friendly interface, so it might be a more tough learning curve for inexperienced users.

With Windows, there are a load of download options. There are builds for numerous running systems (from Windows XP to Windows 11), in 32- and 64-bit tastes, and in portable or installable formats. In addition, there’s a changelog to explain what’s new and an archive of past releases in case the most present doesn’t work on your setup.

After launching it, select ‘Connect to a recommended server,’ and the app will connect to your closest location. When you’re finished, you just click Disconnect. Easy enough for anyone, but Eddie can do a lot more given that AirVPN provides more fine-tuned complete control over operations than any other VPN app we’ve seen.

AirVPN Eddie Servers List

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

Although it defines “kill switch” throughout the settings, AirVPN has actually a tab called “network lock” that does the very same thing. The difference is that AirVPN’s “network lock” stops all traffic that isn’t going through its safe and secure tunnel. Many standard kill switches only do this when the VPN is on, but you can set up the “network lock” to filter your traffic at all times.

Eddie’s layout is easy to understand. Along the top, there are 6 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 displays all readily available servers in the network, together with comprehensive info about each one, such as the server’s nickname, area, latency in milliseconds from your area, and existing users and server load. Impressive stuff!

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

The Countries page displays the number of servers readily available in each nation at a look, together with an indicator of server load and user numbers. Similar to the Servers page, the amber/green sign 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 found on the right rail of the Countries tab. Highlight a country, click the green checkmark, and the servers for that nation will appear on the Servers tab. This whitelist is basically a favorites list; you may choose as numerous nations as you like.

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

By choosing a country, you are not immediately connected to a VPN server. To do so, go back to the Servers page and pick the server you want in a specific country. 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). There are likewise a checkmark, “X,” and blank box icons. There’s also a “refresh” button to get updated info on ping times and load times.

The Speed tab displays a basic 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 a lot of apps show your existing VPN server location and IP address at most. Eddie’s Stats page also shows fine-grained information, such as the server’s location, load, current user count, protocol, port, encryption algorithm, session start time and length, IPv6 exit address, information uploaded and downloaded, and a lot more.

Power users, in particular, should value the capability to utilize a VPN with all the information they might ever desire about the different locations, down to the number of users on a particular server. It’s a priceless resource.

Finally, Logs is a detailed record of connections, routes, and other information.

This enables you to tweak the setup, such as whether it needs to always connect when opened, which protocol to use between UDP and TCP, and which port number. Proxies, Tor support, custom DNS servers, and routes can be modified.

The truly knowledgeable user can enter into Advanced and Expert Mode settings, which allow, to name a few things, sending orders to the OpenVPN Management User Interface by means of the Logs pane.

If the large feature list appears frightening, even if you are a VPN expert, it might be difficult to find out what particular settings do and how to get the desired results. In addition, it is unlike any other service in regards to personalization.

Don’t dismiss AirVPN’s Eddie simply due to the fact that of its intricacy. Remember that the program generally works fine on its own, and you’ll never ever see the settings up until you try to find them. If you occasionally long for power or configurability, the app will provide 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?

Although there isn’t any VPN software for iOS, you can utilize an incredibly feature-rich Android VPN app instead. This software application offers the very same comprehensive setup choices as its desktop sibling and handy status information.

Different pages for country and server lists are what the Android app does not have that the desktop versions provides. Rather, you can expand a nation and pick a particular city on the very same page. Some useful text additions make the details more easy to understand, but it’s still quite tough to comprehend in some spots.

Android does not have as numerous settings as Windows. That’s not a significant critique; there are still many more than the majority of people will ever need. The software application also tries a little bit more to assist you, with extra text subtitles to explain what each option 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 good, with the app detecting when the VPN tunnel drops, informing us with a desktop notification, and reconnecting us in seconds.

In terms of personal privacy, leak tests showed that AirVPN’s Windows client didn’t have any DNS leaks, which shows 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 because AirVPN just supports OpenVPN.

Reviewers have reported speeds to be outstanding. One said there wasn’t a single country where they could grumble about the speed. On the contrary, it was actually outstanding overall.

While it wasn’t rather at the top tier for VPNs that utilize WireGuard, it was still more than fast enough for many people, and circumstances like HD video, video gaming, and streaming conferencing absolutely won’t slow you down.

What AirVPN does not have is a broader variety of server locations. This might limit the availability of close-by servers for some users (which will constantly result in much better speeds). As a result, this VPN is an exceptional choice for most people in the United States and Europe, but possibly less so for other regions.

Streaming

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

Indeed, some report that Air is quite poor for streaming and does not work with any of the significant streaming services. It appears to work with less-popular streaming apps like Peacock and Sony Crackle.

Another reviewer says services like BBC iPlayer and US Netflix hardly ever work, and when they do, finding the right server needs prolonged trial and error. This is probably due to the fact that, unlike other companies, AirVPN does not offer servers that are optimised for accessing streaming websites.

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

Streaming is certainly not an area in which AirVPN excels, merely because that’s not what the service is about, as they are more focused on privacy and security.

Does AirVPN Permit Torrenting?

Yes, it does; every web protocol, including peer-to-peer, is welcome. Undoubtedly, Air supports P2P file-sharing on all of its servers. There’s absolutely nothing to configure, no hoops to jump through. Merely connect to the VPN server of your choice and start.

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

File sharing has good speeds on local servers, allows port forwarding for as much as 20 ports simultaneously (which lets you connect to more peers for faster speeds), and deals with top 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 extremely hassle-free, particularly if you need to leave your connection unattended.

Reviewers have actually shown torrenting to be outstanding, smooth running with quick download and upload speeds, and without any concerns whatsoever.

AirVPN Plans & Prices

AirVPN provides a larger variety of plans than most VPNs. As standard, each plan lets you connect up to 5 gadgets all at once, so you can connect your PC, phone, tablet, and a couple of other gadgets all at the same time.

This makes it an excellent choice for people who live in a household house or wish to use a VPN on a public network. While 5 really should be enough for the majority of people, other VPN companies provide 7 or even 10 if you need more.

Rates differs based on the membership length, and each plan includes the same features. Most plans provide good value; nevertheless, longer memberships use the very best deal.

The standard pricing is in Euros. They utilize the European Central Bank to supply real-time exchange rates for those overseas, so it can be quickly transformed to and paid for in the currency of your option.

The present plans offered 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, including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Doge. Lots of global options are also accepted, such as Alipay and Giropay.

AirVPN offers a three-day free trial, which can be obtained by sending out a message to the support team and utilizing the discount coupon code they send you.

There’s also a 30-day money-back guarantee, as long as they haven’t broken the terms of service or utilized 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 e-mail support and frequently asked questions (FAQs) and has a very active assistance online forum with contributors from both the service itself and the community.

Importantly, AirVPN’s e-mail assistance isn’t contracted out however can be a little irregular with the time it requires to get a response. That stated, the email support is high quality, and the agents are useful and friendly, but the thorough answers can be pretty technical, which might put off those brand-new to VPNs.

AirVPN’s site has a great deal of details, consisting of a big FAQs area that is broken up by topic.

AirVPN’s community forums cover many different subjects, but novices will have the exact same problems understanding a lot of the tech jargon in the posts.

AirVPN Pros & Cons

Pros:

No logging Whatsoever.

Outstanding speeds with minimal loss.

Unrestricted P2P permitted 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 installation and usage.

Many, many advanced settings and customization options in the client app.

Solid Customer Care.

Active Community Online Forums and Detailed Guides.

Great rates, especially for longer-term plans.

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

Cons:

Only fully supports OpenVPN.

Client app isn’t really user-friendly or attractive like other services.

Client app may overwhelm newer users.

It is really hit and miss with streaming services.

No native iOS or ChromeOS apps.

Possibly there are too many advanced alternatives.

Located in 14-Eyes Nation.

Server numbers are reasonably low.

Rounding Things Up – Is AirVPN The Very Best Option?

So the bottom line is that AirVPN is a strong, trustworthy, and safe VPN service with excellent rates. It’s clearly tailored towards more power and advanced users, so those brand-new to VPNs will be much better served by a less, shall we say, specialized VPN company. But even new users might do much, much worse.

While it could be challenging to utilize if you’re brand-new to VPNs, you’ll receive much quicker speeds and better results than a number of its competing VPN competitors.

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

It may not ensure the same level of personal privacy and privacy as a service like Mullvad, which assigns you a random account number and allows you to pay in cash, AirVPN is still a great option for consumers who value their 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!

Click Here Or Below To Join AirVPN Today!!

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