The Best VPNs for Torrenting

Being a verified no-logs VPN, PIA doesn’t store any user data or connection logs.

This policy is backed up by independent audits and PIA’s regularly updated transparency reports.

And for additional peace of mind, PIA’s server network is completely diskless, making it incredibly hard to see or extract your torrenting activity.

If that wasn’t enough, PIA encrypts your internet traffic with either AES-256 or ChaCha20 encryption, depending on which protocol you select: either WireGuard or OpenVPN.

We used Wireshark, a data packet analyzer, to verify that the VPN fully encrypted our P2P traffic. And so it did, as you can see below.

To prevent any unexpected IP leaks, PIA comes with built-in IPv4/IPv6 leak protection and a customizable kill switch. In 10 years of testing, PIA has never exposed our real IP address.

Finally, PIA’s MACE ad and malware blocker was extremely effective at de-cluttering torrent websites and blocking known bad destination URLs.

PIA allows BitTorrent traffic on all 18,651 servers spanning across 91 countries.

While connected to a nearby US server, we recorded an average bitrate of 9.6MiB/s.

It wasn’t the fastest torrenting speed we recorded, but it was quick enough to quickly download large files, including 4K movie torrents.

If you don’t want to simply leech, and share the love with other torrenters in the swarm, you can also use PIA’s port forwarding tool to speed up your uploads.

Just remember that it’s not available on US servers. And as PIA randomly assigns port numbers, make sure you add the new port to your torrent client before you begin file sharing.

True to the Proton brand, its VPN service breezed through our rigorous security testing.

Our Wireshark packet analysis confirmed that its implementation of OpenVPN and WireGuard is rock-solid, rendering our traffic completely unreadable.

While its use of Perfect Forward Secrecy is fairly standard industry practice, Proton VPN truly stands out by making its desktop and mobile apps fully open-source for external experts to audit.

The platform isn’t just resting on its current defenses, either. Proton has future-proofed its architecture with post-quantum protection to safeguard against next-generation cyberattacks.

Proton VPN is equally bulletproof when it comes to everyday privacy. It operates its own DNS servers (not subject to third-party setup and maintenance) protected by a verified no-logs policy.

The only minor flaw in this otherwise pristine security suite is the kill switch. While it worked flawlessly during our stress tests across all platforms, it isn’t enabled by default.

Remember to activate it when you first launch the VPN app to ensure your internet connection is safely severed if the VPN ever drops unexpectedly.

Very little separates Proton VPN from PIA, but one area where the former lags behind is torrenting speed.

While PIA registered an average bitrate of 9.6MiB/s, Proton VPN only achieved 9.2MiB/s.

Truth be told, you’ll barely notice the difference, but our tests show that Proton VPN downloads files at a slower pace than its main rivals.

A slightly annoying aspect of Proton VPN is that you’re forced to use its P2P-enabled servers for torrenting.

While you’ll find them easily through the P2P tab in the Countries area of the app, not being able to just torrent via the standard server list is annoying.

On the plus side, Proton VPN’s P2P server coverage spans across 144 countries, the highest count in the industry.