A Virtual Private Network (VPN) should be considered a must-have in today's life. The fact is, to keep your data safe, you need to have a VPN that you can use. A VPN can be very effective at keeping your Internet Service Provider (ISP) from being able to see what you are doing. It can also be an effective way to keep them from throttling your speeds. After all, if you pay for 1 Gig Fiber Internet, you don't want to be limited to less than that just because you are streaming on Netflix or another service. It is also necessary because an increasing number of people are using public WiFi hot spots. If you are routinely using them without a VPN, you are putting yourself at risk of being hacked.
However, not all VPNs are created equal. There are some VPN providers that you will want to blacklist completely. The key things that you should check to figure out which are the best free VPNs.
One of the main things that you should be concerned with when trying to find the best free VPNs would be the features that it comes with. You want to look at the features before anything else because it could eliminate the option. If the VPN that you are considering doesn't offer all of the features that you require, you may find it unusable for your needs. Therefore, you should be looking closely at the features the VPN comes with. This way, you can end up finding and choosing a VPN provider that is capable of offering the requisite features that you deem are must-have. There are several features you may be considering as a must-have. For instance, you may find having an easy to use a desktop client to be a must-have. You also may consider having the ability to have multi-users as crucial. These are the things that you need to factor into your decision-making process.
Another major thing that you should be considering when you are shopping around for the right provider would be the privacy policy they have. You want to read their privacy policy as thoroughly as possible. This will give you everything you need to know about your data. It will tell you what data they collect, and it will even tell you what they will be using your data for. This is very important to do when choosing a VPN because they will have access to all of your Internet traffic. Therefore, you want to ensure that they are going to be using your data correctly. Also, depending on what you will be using the VPN for, you want to ensure that it meets your criteria.
Another thing that you should be considering would be whether or not it offers cross-client compatibility. For some, you may want to use the same VPN on your Windows machine as you would use on your Android or iOS device. Because of this, you want to see if they offer different clients for the devices you routinely use. This can give you a good idea of whether or not they offer the cross-platform support you need.
You will want to check on whether they will be holding you to a specific data limit. A lot of the free VPN providers will limit you to a specific amount of data that you will be able to use at a time. Therefore, you want to check to see if the limits will be compatible with what you intend to use it for. For instance, if you plan on streaming continually or even downloading torrents with the VPN, you may find low data limits to be prohibitive and a deal-breaker.
Another thing that you should be concerned with would be throttling. Many of the free VPNs you will find available will throttle speeds to offer the service to as many people as possible. Likewise, a lot of the VPN providers that offer free service do so in tiers. If that same provider offers paid service, you will be placed in the lower tier. Therefore, the paid users are automatically going to take priority over your usage as a free user. Therefore, you can expect to get much slower speeds in comparison.
You shouldn't necessarily expect to get the best customer support when signing up for and using a free VPN service. After all, you are getting the service without spending any money upfront. While they are certainly monetizing their servers and service in other ways, you aren't directly paying for it. Therefore, you shouldn't expect to get the best customer support. However, some VPNs do offer better support than others.
This is a great offering. This is a good free option for those who want to have plenty of cross-compatibility with other operating systems as you will find the app available on Mac, iOS, and Android along with Windows.
This is another good option for those who are looking for a free VPN. You will be able to get plenty of bandwidth to utilize as long as you aren't a heavy user.
This is another good option to consider on the free tier. The beauty of ProtonVPN is the ability to use as much data as you want. While you should expect to get throttled with lower priority than the paid users, you won't be limited in the total amount of data you use.
As you can tell, there are plenty of reasons to get yourself a VPN. A free VPN is an excellent way to save money and get some of the same benefits. That being said, you will have to make sacrifices when it comes to free VPNs, and you shouldn't expect nearly the same performance or support as paid alternatives.