PIA VPN Review

We personally read through PIA’s privacy policy and confirmed that it’s a genuine no-logs VPN, meaning it doesn’t store anything that can be used to identify you.

All PIA collects is your email address and payment details at sign-up, which is standard practice and kept separate from your online activity. If you’re uncomfortable with this, you can use an anonymous payment method, like Bitcoin, and an email account with an alias.

PIA’s Privacy Policy confirms it doesn’t collect your browsing history, IP address, or connection timestamps.

Its logging policy has been verified on several occasions. PIA had no data to hand over to the FBI following a court case in 2016 and the Russian government were unable to retrieve any user data during a server seizure of the same year.

Moreover, PIA’s privacy policy was audited by Deloitte in April 2024, and found to have stored no data or activity that could be used to identify PIA users.

PIA also releases regular transparency reports that detail the number of requests for user data it has received from government agencies, along with how many it has compiled with. At the time of writing, that number is zero.

Jurisdiction & Ownership

PIA is incorporated in the United States, a member of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance and a nation with invasive data laws in place. Thankfully, PIA’s proven no-logs policy nullifies this as it has nothing to hand over to US authorities.

PIA was originally developed by London Trust Media Inc. (LTMI), a company with a history of creating privacy tools, before being acquired by Kape Technologies in November 2019.

At the time, this acquisition garnered some controversy due to Kape’s past association with an SDK platform that third parties used for ad injection. Thankfully, this platform shut down in 2016, and PIA has actually improved its privacy under Kape’s ownership with multiple Deloitte audits alongside the addition of transparency reports.

How Private Is Private Internet Access Compared to Other VPNs?

In the table below you can see how PIA compares to five other private VPNs in key areas, like their logging policies and jurisdictions:

Despite offering streaming-optimized servers in 11 countries, we found that PIA is a poor choice for global streaming. This was most evident in our Netflix testing, where PIA unblocked 11 fewer libraries than NordVPN and 12 fewer than ExpressVPN.

Private Internet Access consistently works with US Netflix

Keep reading for a detailed analysis of Private Internet Access’ streaming performance:

Consistently Unblocks US Streaming Services

If you’re only interested in accessing American platforms, like Hulu or Max, then PIA is a cheap and reliable option. We found that all of its servers work for US streaming, but its streaming-optimized servers had the highest success rate.

We’d much prefer that PIA made its entire server network optimized for streaming, like ExpressVPN does, instead of having two separate server types. This is an unnecessary distinction and isn’t immediately obvious to new users.

On the rare occasion we were blocked from a site, we switched between PIA’s servers across all 50 states until one worked — usually on the second attempt.

PIA streamed Max with ease.

PIA Streams Some UK Content

In our personal experience, PIA only worked with BBC iPlayer when we connected to its UK streaming-optimized server. We were never able to get its standard servers to work, which left us frustrated at the disparity.

PIA only works with BBC iPlayer on its UK Streaming Optimized server.

Similarly, our access to ITVX and Channel 4 was only possible when we selected an optimized server. The one noticeable exception is Sky Go which we couldn’t access on any of PIA’s servers, including its Irish server location.

Avoid PIA for International Streaming

As part of our review process, we test every VPN with the most popular streaming services from around the globe. Sadly, PIA struggled to unblock the vast majority, including DAZN Canada and RaiPlay.

PIA’s streaming optimized servers were useless for global platforms.

That said, we were able to access more niche platforms due to PIA’s large server network. For instance, it’s our top choice for watching Champions League games for cheap from tabii in Turkey and for watching blackout NHL games.

PIA’s Streaming Performance Compared to Other Top VPNs

The table below compares Private Internet Access to other streaming VPNs based on Netflix and BBC iPlayer access, and whether streaming with Smart DNS is available:

We connected to PIA servers across six different continents from our testing location in New York, US. We use a 100Mbps internet connection, similar to what your baseline speed at home might be.

Here are PIA’s full speed test results:

Testing PIA’s speeds, we recorded a speed loss of just 95Mbps on short-distance connections — an incredibly fast result.

We conduct every speed test using our own purpose-built tool to ensure consistency.

Its long-distance connection speeds were less impressive, but still fast enough for streaming, torrenting, and web browsing.

As expected, the servers located furthest from our testing base in the US recorded the largest speed losses.

However, even over the longest possible distances PIA is still quick. If you need to connect to the other side of the world then you can count on PIA to affect your download speeds as little as possible – we still routinely hit speeds of 82Mbps when connected to a server in Australia.

The main issue which arose in our speed testing with PIA is that it lacks the consistency of some of its fastest rivals. There can be big swings from week-to-week, which holds it back – but only slightly.

There are still faster VPN services than PIA, mainly over long-distances. In our Hotspot Shield review we highlight the VPN’s exceptional global speeds, for example. However, as you can see above, PIA matches or outperforms plenty of big VPN names.

PIA Has Ping Times Low Enough for Smooth Gaming

We also measure ping times while testing VPN speeds, and PIA impressed us. You can leave PIA connected while gaming and you shouldn’t notice any difference to your gameplay — not just when connected to a nearby server, but also if you’re connected to a server in another country.

We could play on a shared Minecraft server with PIA running and it didn’t affect our gameplay at all.

PIA put up a ping of 6ms when connected to a server in the same city as us — totally unnoticeable versus a ping of 4ms with no VPN on at all.

If you like to play games like World of Warcraft or League of Legends on servers in a different region to your own, PIA is still a great choice: it only raised our ping to 6ms when we were connected to the UK (3,500 miles away).

Encryption & Tunneling Protocols

We tested PIA’s encryption by analyzing our web traffic while connected to a nearby PIA server. We were delighted to discover that our browsing activity was fully encrypted throughout the VPN session.

Our web traffic was encrypted, only displaying incoherent symbols.

You can choose between OpenVPN with AES-256 encryption or WireGuard with ChaCha20. These are both secure configurations that passed our Wireshark testing.

We were also pleased to see that the obselete IKEv2 and L2TP/IPSec protocols have been removed from PIA’s apps. That said, the VPN defaults to the less secure AES-128 encryption, so we suggest you immediately select the AES-256 cipher in your settings, or switch protocols to WireGuard.

Dependable Leak Protection

PIA provides built-in protection against IPv4, IPv6, and DNS leaks. All of this works automatically, except DNS leak protection which must be manually enabled in the Windows app.

PIA passed our leak testing.

We also tested PIA using our self-developed leak test tool, and detected no vulnerabilities whatsoever. As such, you can use PIA online without fear of your IP address, DNS, or WebRTC leaking.

Security Features

PIA is one of the safest VPNs to use, due to its abundance of security features and safety measures. We’ve explained each feature in the sections that follow so you know how it protects you online and whether you need it enabled.

PIA lets you switch between ciphers and customize your port number.

While PIA is safer than most VPNs we’ve tested, it’s still missing some security features. We’ve covered the most essential ones below, along with an explanation of how they work and why they’re important:

The majority of PIA’s servers are in Europe and North America. This wide US coverage makes PIA the best VPN to stream blackout NHL games, though it spread elsewhere is also impressive. In practice, wherever you’re located you’ll be able to connect to a nearby PIA server.

This makes PIA an excellent VPN for connecting to specific countries. For example, it’s the best VPN for getting a US IP address because it offers the largest number of US IP addresses. It also has the most Argentina and Canada servers, making it the best VPN for getting an Argentina IP address and for accessing Canadian websites.

You can see how Private Internet Access’ server network compares to other VPN services in the table below:

In turn, this boosts PIA’s speed, with an average speed loss of 5% on local connections. You can read more about the VPN’s speed performance in the dedicated section of this review.

Virtual Server Locations

Private Internet Access only uses bare-metal (physical) servers, but 41% of its server locations are virtually located.

PIA clearly labels its virtual server locations with a globe icon. They can be disabled by toggling off ‘Include Geo-Located Regions’ in the apps’ settings.

A virtual server location assigns you an IP address in your chosen location, even if the physical server is located elsewhere. This allows VPN companies to offer IP addresses in countries where it’s very hard to operate a physical server.

They can also improve speeds if the physical server is closer to your real location than the IP address you’re assigned. However, if the physical server is further from your physical location than advertised, performance may also drop significantly.

Using virtual server locations isn’t a problem if done properly. PIA’s clear labeling of these servers, alongside allowing you to disable them entirely, is a good level of transparency.

Installation & Setup

We didn’t encounter any issues installing PIA, with setup taking less than 2 minutes. This was consistent across all platforms that we test.

When first launched, the Windows app runs in the system tray by default, meaning its pinned to the bottom right of your device’s screen. The option to detach the app from the tray is hidden in the ‘General’ section of the app’s settings, which is neither obvious nor easy to find.

Similarly, the PIA Mac app launches as a menu bar app by default. Even once detached, traditional keyboard shortcuts do not work with the app.

In contrast, we had no difficulties setting up PIA’s iOS or Android app. Simply add the VPN configuration to your device and you’re ready to go.

Interface & Ease of Use

PIA’s apps are compact and stylish, featuring a simple dark-gray background with white text and green and orange highlights to indicate connection status. We found this very easy to read, and we didn’t notice any eye strain when testing, even when switching to its lighter background.

We were most impressed by the level of customization offered within the apps, allowing users to tailor the home screen to your needs and level of technical experience. To do so, click the downward arrow on desktop or the top-rightmost bottom on mobile, where you can choose to add or remove a number of features or displays.

For example, we added a selection of popular server locations for quicker access and removed our current IP address from the default display.

This level of customization also applies to PIA’s individual features, with the option to change DNS servers, switch encryption ciphers, and edit split tunneling rules.

Day-to-Day Experience

Our user experience with PIA steadily improved over time as we began to familiarize ourselves with all of its extra features and settings.

This process was quickest with the iPhone app, as PIA works with all the iOS shortcuts. For example, we loved that you could toggle the VPN on and off from your iPhone’s lock screen. This was not only convenient, but it made PIA’s iOS app feel bespoke to the platform instead of just being a ported version of its desktop client.

However, using the apps regularly also exposed some minor pain points. For instance, clicking ‘VPN Kill Switch’ under ‘Quick Settings’ on the Android app doesn’t enable the kill switch, but instead displays a wall of text explaining how to activate it. We found this a needless waste of time and especially unintuitive given its label as a ‘quick’ setting.

We were also surprised to learn that PIA’s iOS app doesn’t include the MACE ad-blocker. This felt particularly disconcerting when switching from the Android or desktop app where MACE is readily available.

You can see a full overview of the features available on each platform, and any disparities, in the table below:

Out of the 61 VPN services we’ve tested, PIA is the best for torrenting. On a fixed 10MiB/s connection, we recorded an average bitrate of 9.6MiB/s with PIA. The slowdown in speed is so minimal that we almost forgot we were using a VPN — even for 20GB+ downloads.

For example, it took us 4 minutes and 40 seconds to torrent the complete works of William Shakespeare, which increased to just 5 minutes when connected to a PIA server.

PIA performed best in our torrenting tests.

This is significantly faster than most VPNs, including our top-2 rated services: ExpressVPN and NordVPN.

PIA permits torrenting on all servers and platforms. In our experience, we’ve never encountered any throttling or bandwidth restrictions when using PIA for file-sharing. You can simply connect to your nearest server and begin downloading.

MACE, PIA’s built-in ad blocker, can also help block any trackers or malware you come across in the process.

PIA Supports Dynamic Port Forwarding

Port Forwarding lets you increase the number of torrenting peers you can communicate with, and drastically improves P2P upload speeds.

Once enabled in settings, PIA’s port forwarding feature automatically redirects incoming connections to bypass any NAT firewall.

PIA uses dynamic port forwarding, meaning your port number changes each time you connect. As a result, you have to manually add your port number to your torrent client every time you torrent. We found this process time-consuming, and forgetting to update it led to several IP leaks in our testing.

As shown above, PIA is compatible with any device. It is one of 10 VPN services to provide an Apple TV app and its Smart DNS tool lets you change your IP address on devices that don’t support VPNs like games consoles.

PIA can also be installed on DD-WRT, Merlin, Pfsense, and OpenWRT/LEDE routers. However it doesn’t have a bespoke router app like ExpressVPN, and its performance while doing so is limited. Setup is slow and it’s not very intuitive to use – we don’t recommend using PIA at router level (and neither does PIA itself).

PIA also provides browser extensions for Chrome and Firefox that secure your traffic using Squid HTTPS. Many VPNs, like PrivateVPN, overlook browser extensions so we’re glad to see this isn’t the case with PIA.

PIA’s Shadowsocks Beats Censorship

We test PIA VPN’s access in China weekly, using our test Shanghai server. We connect to it remotely from our test office to see if PIA can genuinely unblock websites inside China.

Over the past three months, PIA has recorded an uptime of 50% in China. That’s not quite reliable enough to make it one of the best VPNs for China, but it sits just outside of the top five.

To bypass the Great Firewall with PIA, use the OpenVPN protocol and enable the Shadowsocks proxy within the app’s settings.

Watch us using PIA to access blocked websites in China in the video below.

PIA uses Shadowsocks, which is a third-party proxy developed specifically for use in China.

Although Shadowsocks is not as safe or effective as proprietary VPN obfuscation tools, it can access popular apps and websites like Instagram, Facebook, Gmail, and WhatsApp.

Customizable Split Tunneling for Advanced Users

Aside from iOS, all of PIA’s apps include split tunneling. This feature lets you designate specific apps for the VPN tunnel and includes the option of ‘inverse split tunneling’ if you want to select apps for exclusion instead.

We used split tunneling to limit PIA’s encryption to torrenting traffic.

PIA is also unique in that it allows you to designate traffic for the VPN tunnel not just by app, which is common among VPNs, but also by IP address — similar to what AirVPN does.

This level of customization and user-friendliness is unmatched.

Multi-hop Uses an Encrypted Proxy Server

PIA lets you route your traffic through a VPN server and a proxy to create a multi-hop connection.

While we’d prefer a second VPN server, a proxy IP address has the added benefit of hiding the fact that you’re using a VPN. This can be useful if you need to obfuscate your VPN connection from local or national censorship.

You can choose between a Shadowsocks or SOCKS5 proxy as the additional ‘hop’. Your connection is encrypted throughout, ensuring your personal data remains secure.

Dedicated IP Addresses

PIA also offers dedicated IP addresses. These IP addresses are unique to you and remain the same every time you connect.

Disappointingly, they cost an extra $5.00 per month and don’t work with any streaming services.

Instead, PIA’s dedicated IP feature is meant for accessing sites that use an allowlist. For example, to access online banking or a remote server.

With such limited use cases, we recommend you avoid this feature unless you have a specific reason for using it.