Privacy

Mullvad removed port forwarding in May 2023, leaving thousands who relied on it for seeding Linux ISOs hunting for alternatives. ProtonVPN added it back by mid-2024. And NordVPN had run dedicated P2P servers the whole time. Yet most torrenting VPN guides still quote feature matrices from 2024. So we spent two weeks testing eight major VPNs under real torrent workloads. Ten-gigabyte Linux ISOs on public trackers with 300+ seeders. Sustained seeding across 48 hours. And Wireshark running on the side to verify which “no-log” claims hold up. ...

ExpressVPN’s Lightway protocol hits 850 Mbps on a 1 Gbps line — a 15% speed loss that beats every mainstream competitor in our 2026 benchmarks. And it belongs to Kape Technologies, the company behind Crossrider, whose adware software triggered malware alerts on over 25 million machines before the pivot into VPN ownership. So that tension — engineering excellence versus controversial corporate ownership — is the real story here. But most VPN review sites won’t touch it. ...

So here’s something most VPN reviews won’t tell you: the review you’re reading right now was probably paid for. And most VPNs run affiliate programs paying $30–$50 per sale — and that creates a conflict of interest that rarely gets discussed. IVPN does the opposite. It open-sourced its desktop client under GPL-3.0, paid for seven independent security audits, and explicitly refuses to run any affiliate program. That combination makes it one of the most transparent VPNs you can install today. ...

NordVPN is one of the most recognized names in consumer VPNs. But does the marketing match reality? So we spent a full afternoon in early June 2026 running speed tests across four server regions, checking streaming platform access, and verifying privacy claims. Here’s what the data shows. TL;DR: NordVPN is genuinely fast — NordLynx delivers the best throughput we’ve seen on a WireGuard-based protocol. Streaming unblocking is consistent across major platforms. And the Panama jurisdiction plus PwC’s independent audit gives the no-logs claim real weight. But the service is closed-source, and the renewal price jump is steep. If source transparency and a fully auditable stack matter more to you than raw speed, check out our ProtonVPN review — it’s the closest open-source alternative with comparable privacy credentials. ...

Disclosure: Some links below are affiliate links. If you sign up through them, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Mullvad has no affiliate program — all Mullvad recommendations in this article are unbiased. VPNReview has no financial relationship with Mullvad. Four thousand seven hundred servers across 100+ countries. One VPN. And another with just 800 servers it owns outright. And both pass leak tests. Still, both publish audit results publicly. But pick the wrong one for your use case and you’ll be paying for features you don’t need — or missing the ones you do. ...

Disclosure: Some links below are affiliate links. If you sign up through them, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. ProtonVPN — starts at $0 (free) to $12.99/mo with 4,700+ servers in 100+ countries Mullvad has no affiliate program — all Mullvad recommendations in this article are unbiased. Two VPNs dominate the privacy conversation in 2026, and they couldn’t approach the problem more differently. ProtonVPN builds a Swiss-protected ecosystem — 4,700+ servers across 100+ countries, streaming optimizations, and a genuinely unlimited free tier funded by paid subscribers. Mullvad takes the opposite path: flat €5/month pricing, anonymous signup with no email required, and a server network of roughly 800 machines it owns outright. ...

Disclosure: Some links below are affiliate links. If you sign up through them, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. ProtonVPN — Swiss-based with audited no-log policy, starting at $4.99/month Here’s the thing: Most VPNs want your email, your payment method, and a 24-month commitment to qualify for a “discount” that doubles at renewal. Mullvad wants none of those. It charges a flat €5/month — the same price for every user, every month, no tiers, no upsells, no “limited time offer” countdown timers. In January 2026, Mullvad became the first major VPN to go WireGuard-only, removing OpenVPN from its desktop apps entirely. This quick review covers what actually changed in 2026 and who this VPN is for. ...

ProtonVPN’s Swiss jurisdiction has been audited three times for no-log compliance since 2020 — zero violations found. And Surfshark runs 4,500+ servers across 100 countries and doesn’t cap device count. And one prioritizes verifiable privacy at the architecture level. The other prioritizes feature breadth and unlimited connectivity. But these are two different philosophies competing for the same user. And depending on what you actually need, the wrong pick costs you either more than you should pay or more privacy than you intended to give up. ...