Show More With the internet abuzz with and the potential changes coming to, you’ve likely heard about virtual private networks, better known as VPNs. When used correctly, a VPN can greatly strengthen your online privacy, assist in keeping your personal information secure, and even spoof your location in the world—allowing you to access websites or services that would otherwise be off limits due to region-locking. With the increased popularity of VPNs has come an increased number of VPN providers vying for your business. That makes finding the best one to suit your needs difficult. To help you sort out the right provider for you, we’ve committed to extensive research and testing of VPN services that cater to Mac owners.
Is a Mac OS X VPN Expensive? VPN providers tend to cover a wide range of pricing options and features available. Newer services may offer a To make your search for the best Mac OS X VPN provider in China, we had our team of experts put together a table of the top VPN providers listing. Mac users faces security issue with apples own applications. That's why mac users use Best VPN for mac to improve their mac security. I recommend expressvpn because it works great all over the world, it has great number of servers all over the world.Security is reason to use vpn for mac.
If nothing but the best will do, check out our routinely updated list of category leaders. If you prefer to do your own shopping, we’ve got your back there, too: Each of the VPNs we test is thoroughly reviewed, allowing you to make an informed decision on which one to throw your money at.
See our full list of reviews below. Best VPN overall. On NordVPN NordVPN is a compelling option for VPN service due to a well-rounded set of features and mostly competitive pricing. Is the best all-around VPN service for most Mac users. While it isn’t the fastest VPN service that we’ve tested, it’s not particularly slow, either. (Read our full review.) NordVPN offers above-average data encryption to keep their subscribers’ data safe while tunneling. It’s got a large network of servers, too: over 3,000 servers spread across more than 60 countries, allowing you to spoof a wide number of locations and avoid server congestion.
Moreover, its software interface is easy to use, making even new VPN users feel like online-privacy experts. While it’s not perfect, NordVPN gets more right than any of the other VPN providers we’ve tested so far.
Best VPN for security/privacy. VyprVPN’s connection speeds are less than spectacular, but the company’s commitment to online user security, privacy, and maintaining an open internet for its clients is admirable. While its server connection times won’t win any speed records, owns rather than rents its servers and writes its own code.
Along with its parent company’s long history of online-privacy advocacy and the fact that its offices are located in a country with strict privacy laws, this approach to service makes VyprVPN an excellent choice for journalists, activists, or anyone else who considers digital privacy and online access a paramount concern. (Read our full review.) Fastest VPN overall. CyberGhost's connection speeds make it a great VPN option for most people, but users who deal in sensitive information may wish to look elsewhere for greater privacy from government actors. While we have some concerns about ’s recent change in ownership, its overall average connection speeds are untouchable by any other VPN we’ve tested so far. If you’re interested in connecting to VPN servers located within the continental United States, this Romania-based company is currently the one to beat.
Fastest VPN for other countries If you are interested in connecting to servers in other countries, we’ve found the following to be fast options:. UK: welcomes P2P file sharing on its VPN servers with open arms and offers the best connection speeds to servers in the United Kingdom that we’ve seen so far. Europe: While gave us pause in the areas of user privacy and its ambiguous server numbers, the Canadian VPN provider takes first place when it comes to European connection speeds. Asia: While we weren’t thrilled with its logging policies and the fact that it only allows P2P file sharing on a single server, Israel’s gets top marks when it comes to connecting to servers in Asia. Oceania: If you want to connect with VPN servers down under, is the way to go. How we tested VPNs For each VPN service we review, we conduct tests at three different times of the day: morning, afternoon, and evening, using. We start by measuring the speed of our unprotected internet connection before testing the upload/download speeds of the VPN service.
These tests are conducted to servers located in North America, the UK, Europe, Oceana, and Asia over an ethernet connection with a service provision of 100Mbps. IDG Ookla Speedtest To test upload and download speeds, I closed down all background internet processes on my Mac, using TripMode. The only traffic on my system able to upload or download any data was Ookla. I used this setup to ensure that the numbers that Ookla produced were not stymied by anything else that my computer may have been doing at the time. The speeds Ookla captured were then averaged, providing us with a final numeric score. I then used those scores to calculate a percentage of difference in speeds, which is what you’ll see in our reviews. Since internet speeds change constantly based on server load, how fast your connection is, and a gazillion other factors, we feel this provides a better picture of what you can expect from a service, on the whole, than merely quoting the exact upload/download speeds we encountered during testing.
Speed isn’t the only quantifiable metric that we look at. The number of countries that a VPN offers servers in, total number of servers worldwide, and how much it’ll cost you to connect to those servers on a monthly or annual basis are also taken into consideration when recommending a VPN service to you. Additionally, we conduct hours of research into the VPN providers to find out who owns them, where they’re based, what they do with subscriber information, and whether the provider has a track record of questionable business practices.
Let’s be blunt: you don’t want people seeing what you’re doing on the Internet. Whether it be looking at adult websites, trying to get around government firewalls to get to censored information, or want to use torrents and don’t want nasty letters from your Internet Service provider when you do. Or you’re at a public WiFi and don’t want that guy sitting in the corner with the packet sniffer to see all of your banking information and start buying jewelry for his girlfriend with your credit card. This is why using a trusted (VPN) provider is a good idea.
Nobody can tell what you’re looking at or downloading, because your connection through VPN is encrypted. All the Internet provider, whether it be your cable company or where you work, knows is you’ve connected to a VPN, and that’s it. What you do from there is private, and only for you to know. Just remember – there’s a difference between having a VPN, and a VPN provider or tunnel. Anyone can set up a VPN between any two or more computers.
This way they can all communicate with each other without anyone snooping in. A VPN provider lets you make an encrypted connection to a network that then connects you to the rest of the Internet. Depending on the speed and quality of the VPN connection, it’s just like connecting directly through your local WiFi or Internet connection. The following is a list of the best free VPNs for Mac.
A really good VPN connection can cost anywhere from $10 to $30 a month, but these are just as good for getting started. The List: The Best Free VPNs for Mac So with that, let’s go over the list of the best free VPNs for Mac users. NordVPN employs military-grade, 256-bit key AES encryption to keep your online data safe. If you are serious about protecting your online identity and anonymity, you will be better served by purchasing a full-featured VPN. We believe that NordVPN is your best choice. Note: Get one of the best VPNs out there with 75% OFF. For a limited time only, you can get for only $2.99 a month Some of the features that bring NordVPN on top of the list:.
The ability to hide your IP to keep your Internet activity anonymous. Support for six simultaneous connections that can be used on your Mac as well as Windows, iOS, and Android devices. Automatic kill-switch that shuts down your connection if your VPN connectivity is interrupted.
Onion over VPN routes traffic through Nord’s VPN and then sends it to the Onion Router for added protection, such as when accessing the dark web. SmartPlay technology that ensures access to over 400 geo-restricted streaming services such as Netflix, Pandora and Amazon Prime.
Double data protection sends your data through two VPN servers before reaching its destination, effectively encrypting your data twice. How to use Nord VPN for Free:. Try NordVPN for 7 days for free.
During the 7-day trial, you can cancel your subscription at any time. There are no costs. NordVPN offers 30-day money-back guarantee. Flexible pricing plans make it easy to try this valuable privacy tool. Windscribe comes with a free version.
For those who want a little bit more, the price is affordable starting at $9 a month and going down with a longer commitment. Every list is going to have Windscribe on it. It meets all of our target points:. Secure with AES-256 encryption. Private by not keeping logs. Which means even if someone requests they identify what a customer accesses, they can’t because they don’t store the information.
Robust with servers in 55 countries and 110 cities, so you know wherever you go there’s a way to connect reliably. 10 GB per month of bandwidth traffic. Windscribe provides a VPN client for Mac, but also has Windows and Linux clients for users of other operating systems.
Even bet ter, it can be integrated into browsers like Chrome or Firefox with an extension, so you can just connect the browser through their VPN, and off you go. ProtonVPN provides their security with what they call the “Secure Core”. Rather than just have their users connect and then route them to the Internet through one location, they protect users by forwarding the traffic through multiple servers. This means that people won’t be able to find out where the original computer connected from, increasing your privacy. Along with these features, it includes:. Security with AES-256 encryption. Forward Secrecy where each connection receives new encryption key, so even if someone traced your transmissions before, they can’t use that information to decrypt new ones.
Legal protection being based in Switzerland, where privacy laws are the strongest in the world. ProtonVPN also features no logs so users don’t have to worry that their information will be betrayed later. They include clients for Windows and Mac VPN connections. As an added plus, ProtonVPN has physical security from the use of an old fallout shelter. War never changes, but with strong physical and encryption security, ProtonVPN can keep your connection secure. We didn’t pick TunnelBear just because it’s an adorable name with a mascot that looks like what would happen if Mario was turned into a bear and came out of a warp pipe.
TunnelBear, like the other services, features protections like AES 256-bit encryption and no logging. What TunnelBear adds is a strong push for protection with:. 500 MB of available data, plus another 1 GB if you tweet about them. VPN blocking protection: Some websites and Internet services will block users if they detect that the connection is coming in from a VPN. TunnelBear has systems that make these connection less detectable, so your communication can still go through while protected. Vigilant Mode: This is a very cool feature. If a security issue is detected at any point, then TunnelBear will cut off all unsecured traffic until connections are properly restored.
So when something tries to breach the connection, you can be assured that people can’t try to get around and see what’s happening through unsecure channels. TunnelBear has services in 20 countries, and it’s expanding all the time. Hotspot Shield is one of the most popular choices out there. It has a free VPN option that includes both 128 and 256-bit AES encryption, and features like:. Connection for up to 5 different devices.
Most of the free VPN offerings only allow one connection at a time, while HotSpot Shield allows 5 different devices to connect through the same account. Kill Switch: When a connection issue through the VPN occurs, the computer can start trying to use the regular insecure connection rather than the secure encrypted VPN connection. The Kill Switch stops all communication from the computer to the Internet until the VPN connection is restored, so the traffic that needs to stay private is “always” private. 2500 servers across the globe. This means wherever you go, there’s going to be a local connection that keeps up the speed and security. Honorable Mention: VPN Gate is interesting because it’s the outgrowth of an academic project.
It’s made up of public VPN relay servers, so it’s a community of people working together to provide secure communications for others. It allows protection for people trying to get through government firewalls or just wanting to secure their connection over public WiFi connections. Being a university project, it has clients for any number of operations systems, including a Mac VPN client.
Because of this, it has some features the others don’t:. No registration. Every other service listed requires people register in the hopes that eventually they’ll move to the paid version.
VPN Gate doesn’t have a paid version, so it doesn’t need registration – just install the client and go. Additional users: Users can register to host VPN servers to add to the project, so it’s always growing as the community pitches in. VPN Gate is a fascinating experiment, and for those just looking to do some secure browsing without a ton of extra features, it’s a great fit. The Qualifications for Best VPN Service Picking the best VPN for Mac OS X comes down to three things: Reliability ✅ A VPN is no good if you can’t connect to it. The biggest issue with free VPN providers is they usually provide fewer servers or slower access speed, and reserve the better systems for paying customers.
Kind of a “try it out and upgrade later” system. Security ? People use a VPN provider to keep their browsing and download habits private. So the connection has to use current encryption algorithms to keep hackers and other undesirables out. Speed ? There’s not much of a reason to connect to a VPN provider that makes you feel like you’re using an old dial-up modem. A good VPN provider provides fast access so you aren’t spending all day waiting for something to happen.
It’s Your Privacy Your information, your browsing habits, your connections with the world are your business, and not anyone else’s. Don’t give up your privacy to use a public connection, or even within the privacy of your own home. A good VPN for Mac can let you explore the world without fear.
Hopefully, this list has helped make your life easier, and more secure.