AirVPN Vs ZenMate 2022: Which To Select?

  • Time to read: 16 min.
Affiliate Disclaimer

Full Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links to products/services. We may receive a commission for purchases made through these links.

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

While anybody can claim to be special these days, when it pertains to VPN companies, AirVPN reveals that it truly is.

AirVPN sticks out from other VPN services because of its commitment to protecting user privacy. Right from the start, the AirVPN site 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 declare to be distinct nowadays, when it pertains to VPN service providers, AirVPN shows that it really is.

AirVPN Home Page

They have actually been around a long period of time, since 2010, when it was begun with the help of 2 lawyers and a little group of hackers and activists. The satellite communications service provider Iridium previously ran it, however AirVPN took over 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 business either.

Throughout their About Us and Mission pages, the business’s history is described and information the privacy projects that AirVPN has 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 supplying a VPN created by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.

So 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 a lot of, with only 246 servers spread across 23 nations.

The majority of servers are in Europe (aside from those in the US, Canada, and Hong Kong). A small concern here is that the lack of variety of servers decreases the number of worldwide AirVPN users who may access geo-restricted services in their home country while preserving their personal privacy.

AirVPN Servers

That said, Air is popular for its exceptional performance throughout its server network, with many countries having high-performance physical individual servers.

They use transparent bandwidth allocation methods to supply a precise assessment of performance, without any overbooking or overselling. Plus, they are totally unlimited, with no speed constraints or time limits.

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

Many ports and protocols are available; 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. Forget about PPTP and other unsafe protocols.

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

The use is OpenVPN is a big plus as it automatically improves users’ personal privacy and security and is highly reputable. However, the absence of WireGuard as standard might show Air isn’t rather keeping up with its rivals. That said, AirVPN states it is testing WireGuard, however it won’t put the newer protocol completely in place till a few of its technical and privacy concerns are dealt with.

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

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

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

There is a detailed specs page for AirVPN’s servers, with information like the offered 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 because 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 detailed open-source clients puts your mind at ease.

A good aspect of this is that you can see what other individuals say about the service prior to signing up. You do not 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 concern, with defense from snoopers, data miners, and other entities that invade personal privacy. There is no individual details 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 just gathers non-identifiable “technical information” to keep the server running and enhance services, but you can request this details to be erased at any time. This makes it among the most privacy-friendly VPN services.

As a result, no one can identify you online; not even your ISP can determine what kind of traffic or protocol you’re using.

There’s no listening in, so you can connect to any wi-fi network without stressing over 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 also state they follow EU privacy policies and that any servers outside the EU will be treated with the very same or higher 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 use it to learn who you are. You’ll stay safe with the top-level protection provided.

If your ISP or nation 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 enable you to get a sense of what present users are stating about the service prior to signing up.

All of AirVPN’s software is open-source, which is a huge plus. This implies that anyone can look into AirVPN’s security. ProtonVPN, Private Internet Access, and Mullvad VPN have open-source apps, but only ProtonVPN’s apps have been examined by a 3rd party.

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

When creating an account, you are not required to input any personal info, not even your real e-mail address. That’s fantastic since it lets you prevent leaving any sort of digital footprint. However know that you won’t have the ability to change your account’s password if you do not 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). But even if the federal government requested user information, AirVPN would have absolutely nothing to provide.

Who Or What Is Eddie??

The Eddie UI is the name of AirVPN’s main open-source application, offered on all major platforms and OSes, including Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Unfortunately, despite Eddie’s substantial ability with OpenVPN, it does not yet support WireGuard, so performance isn’t quite as good as those suppliers who use it as requirement.

AirVPN Eddie Overview

Setting up the app is simple, and it has all the info you need to connect to a VPN.

Sadly, 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 challenging learning curve for unskilled users.

With Windows, there are a lot of download choices. There are builds for numerous 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 current does not work on your setup.

After introducing it, choose ‘Connect to a recommended server,’ and the app will connect to your closest location. You just click Disconnect when you’re ended up. Simple enough for anyone, but Eddie can do a lot more because AirVPN provides more fine-tuned complete control over operations than any other VPN app we’ve seen.

AirVPN Eddie Servers List

2 essential AirVPN features through Eddie are its auto-connect and kill switch. AirVPN permits 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 picked last.

Despite the fact that it specifies “kill switch” throughout the settings, AirVPN has a tab called “network lock” that does the same thing. The difference is that AirVPN’s “network lock” stops all traffic that isn’t going through its protected tunnel. Many basic kill switches only do this when the VPN is on, however 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 six tabs: Overview, Servers, Countries, Speed, Stats, and Logs.

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

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

The Countries page displays the variety of servers readily available in each nation at a glimpse, together with a sign of server load and user numbers. Similar to the Servers page, the amber/green sign is likewise shown. Numerous servers have up to 1000 Mb/s bandwidth, while some smaller sized 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 country, click the green checkmark, and the servers for that country will appear on the Servers tab. This whitelist is essentially a favorites list; you might pick as numerous countries as you like.

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

By choosing a country, you are not right away connected to a VPN server. To do so, go back to the Servers page and pick the server you want in a specific country. Then, connect to a server by marking it and clicking the “indication out” icon on the right-hand side (a right-facing arrow pointing into a square bracket). There are also a checkmark, “X,” and blank box icons. There’s likewise a “refresh” button to get updated details 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 the majority of apps show 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, information downloaded and uploaded, and much more.

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

Logs is an in-depth record of connections, routes, and other data.

This permits you to fine-tune the setup, such as whether it must always connect when opened, which protocol to utilize between UDP and TCP, and which port number. Proxies, Tor support, custom DNS servers, and routes can be modified.

The really competent user can go into Advanced and Expert Mode settings, which permit, to name a few things, sending orders to the OpenVPN Management User Interface via the Logs pane.

If the vast feature list appears frightening, even if you are a VPN expert, it might be difficult to figure out what particular settings do and how to get the preferred outcomes. In addition, it differs from any other service in regards to customization.

Don’t dismiss AirVPN’s Eddie simply since of its complexity. Remember that the program normally functions fine on its own, and you’ll never ever see the settings up until you search for them. If you sometimes yearn for power or configurability, the app will offer 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 utilize a very feature-rich Android VPN app instead. This software provides the same comprehensive setup options as its desktop sibling and valuable status information.

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

Android does not have as many settings as Windows. That’s not a significant critique; there are still much more than most people will ever require. The software application also tries a little bit more to help you, with extra text subtitles to explain what each option does.

Speeds/Performance

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

Online reviewers felt the connection monitoring was excellent, with the app spotting when the VPN tunnel drops, notifying us with a desktop alert, 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.

Nevertheless, reviewers have actually reported speeds to be exceptional. Undoubtedly, one said there wasn’t a single country where they could grumble about the speed. On the contrary, it was really remarkable overall.

While it wasn’t rather on top tier for VPNs that use WireGuard, it was still more than fast enough for many people, and scenarios like HD video, streaming, and gaming conferencing definitely won’t slow you down.

What AirVPN does not have is a more comprehensive variety of server areas. This might limit the accessibility of neighboring servers for some users (which will always result in better speeds). As a result, this VPN is an excellent option for most people in the United States and Europe, however possibly 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 effective enough to bypass the VPN blocks used by Netflix in the U.S.A., whereas others do not.

Some report that Air is quite poor 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 says services like BBC iPlayer and US Netflix rarely work, and when they do, finding the right server needs prolonged trial and error. This is probably since, unlike other service providers, AirVPN doesn’t use servers that are optimised for accessing streaming sites.

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 certainly not an area in which AirVPN stands out, merely because 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, including peer-to-peer, is welcome. Air supports P2P file-sharing on all of its servers. There’s absolutely nothing to set up, no hoops to jump through. Simply connect to the VPN server of your option and get going.

Plus, you can utilize 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 Web.

File sharing has good speeds on local servers, permits port forwarding for up to 20 ports at the same time (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 obstruct all traffic from exiting your device if the VPN connection ever drops. That way, you won’t be sending unencrypted packets to the Web. If you are file sharing, a kill switch is extremely practical, especially if you need to leave your connection unattended.

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

AirVPN Plans & Pricing

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

This makes it an outstanding option for people who live in a family house or want to use a VPN on a public network. While 5 should be enough for many people, other VPN service providers offer 7 or even 10 if you require more.

Prices varies based on the subscription length, and each plan consists of the exact same features. The majority of plans provide good value; nevertheless, longer memberships use the best deal.

The standard pricing is in Euros. However, they use the European Central Bank to supply 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 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 alternatives are likewise 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 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 during that time.

AirVPN Customer Support

AirVPN has a different customer assistance offering than numerous other VPNs. While it does not have live chat, it provides e-mail assistance and frequently asked questions (FAQs) and has an extremely active assistance 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 inconsistent with the time it requires to get a reaction. That said, the e-mail support is high quality, and the representatives are friendly and valuable, but the comprehensive responses can be pretty technical, which may put off those brand-new to VPNs.

AirVPN’s website has a lot of details, including a large Frequently asked questions section that is broken up by topic.

AirVPN’s community forums cover various topics, however novices will have the exact same problems understanding a lot of the tech jargon in the posts.

AirVPN Pros & Cons

Pros:

No logging Whatsoever.

Exceptional speeds with very little loss.

Unrestricted 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 installation and use.

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

Solid Client 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 user-friendly or pretty like other services.

Client app might overwhelm newer users.

It is very hit and miss with streaming services.

No native iOS or ChromeOS apps.

Possibly there are too many advanced options.

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, trusted, and safe VPN service with good rates. It’s clearly geared towards more power and advanced users, so those new to VPNs will be better served by a less, shall we say, specialized VPN provider. 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 many of its rival VPN competitors.

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

Although it might not ensure the same level of personal privacy and privacy as a service like Mullvad, which assigns you a random account number and permits you to pay in cash, AirVPN is still a great alternative for consumers who value their privacy.

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

Highly recommended!

Click Here Or Below To Join AirVPN Today!!

AirVPN: Can It Unblock Restrictions On Amazon Prime?