Proton VPN Review
Community-sourced VPN review based on real Reddit & Twitter discussions
Proton VPN has a solid reputation as a privacy-focused VPN, and a lot of people like it because it feels trustworthy and reliable day to day. The free plan gets praised a lot as one of the better “act...
What the Community Says
Proton VPN has a solid reputation as a privacy-focused VPN, and a lot of people like it because it feels trustworthy and reliable day to day. The free plan gets praised a lot as one of the better “actually usable” free options, and the paid plan is often mentioned as a good pick if you care about things like no-logs, audits, and even anonymous payment options. It also comes up often alongside other privacy tools (like Proton Mail), which makes it appealing if you want everything under one roof.
The biggest complaint is speed: some people switch over from other VPNs and find Proton noticeably slower, especially depending on the server. A few also don’t love how certain torrenting setups work, since things like port forwarding can be a bit annoying to manage if the port changes when you reconnect. And while many trust Proton more than typical “affiliate-list” VPNs, there’s still a slice of people who are skeptical or just prefer competitors like Mullvad.
Strengths
- Strong privacy reputation
- Best-in-class free tier
- No-logs and audit-focused image
- Anonymous payment options
- Good reliability overall
Weaknesses
- Can be slower than competitors
- Port forwarding can be annoying for torrenting setups
- Auto-connect behavior can be frustrating
- Not everyone trusts it as much as top privacy rivals
Summary generated 1 week ago from 1012 community mentions
Filter by Topic
Clear ×Performance by Use Case
Compare Proton VPN With...
Reviews about "Speed Performance"
18 reviews"Proton vpn is the goat, proton pass is the goat, the entire proton environment is amazing. I get way better speeds with proton vpn than I did with nord and the UI is so much smoother."
"+1 Switched to proton after its free version outperformed surfshark/nord/express/PIA paid versions (I had access to all). 11 months in and still the right choice. I still try the others from time to time to check in"
"ProtonVPN is 100% better in terms of privacy and reputation. And, speed still comes close to Nord. Both are excellent for normal usage tho. Some of my friends prefer Nord over Proton(they play games) for very unknown reasons. "
"I’ve had proton for years. Even bought their 2 year pass last August and haven’t had a single issue with speed"
"@shanrocksnwa Proton free VPN is good and fast"
"I have been using ProtonVPN for months and speeds have been mostly stable for me, especially on nearby servers. Support answered once within a day, so I would not say it completely fell off, but results probably depend on location."
"ProtonVPN’s great because of the unlimited data, but yeah, those free servers can get sluggish during peak hours. Still solid if you don’t need high speed all the time."
"Same here, Proton has been pretty smooth for me too."
"Pretty fair take. Proton is solid for privacy, just not always the fastest option."
"Mullvad is slower compared to proton. But its sometbing you can trust your privacy with. In most cases proton is better but mullvad is like that trustworthy neighbor who is just there for you in your time of need. It is also technically ch..."
"...eed and connectivity became an issue a several years ago so I switched. Right now, I’m trying out Proton VPN."
"@smspoolnet I like Mullvad a lot too. Use nord proton ipvanish as well and only thing I don’t like is speeds sometime on mull can be hell"
"Proton is an exception. Their free variant is slower and doesn't allow file-sharing anyway "
"Bin aber über 1&1 welche über vodafone laufen, habe aber das selbe problem. Hab Proto VPN benutzt aber das scheint beim kostenlosen die leistung zu drosseln"
"Glad to hear that you are happy with them. I am just going by a lot of YouTube and social media reviews on the top VPN services. They are always number 4 in line behind Express, Nord, and SurfShark in the ratings. They are not known for the..."
"I’ve been using express vpn for years. It has a kill switch and is super fast. I bought proton’s Black Friday deal hoping to save money, but it’s way slower and doesnt work very good with a few apps on my shield. The app that’s call..."
"I’ve been using express VPN in Ireland all week. I bought the Black Friday deal for proton as expressVPN is more expensive than most. I will not be renewing proton as it’s much slower."
"@PaulTassi Proton VPN needs to worry less about Marathon and worry more about their slow-ass upload speeds."