Psiphon Review

Here’s a table showing the types of data that Psiphon stores:

Psiphon’s logging policy is dreadful. It collects detailed activity and connection logs, as explained in its extensive privacy policy.

Psiphon admits to inspecting domain names (websites) you visit while connected, but not full URLs. It also saves your IP address in order to determine your location, and keeps that information for an uncertain period of time.

At the very least, Psiphon doesn’t require you to give over any payment information or email details before using the free app, which we like.

All the data Psiphon collects is discarded after “at most” 90 days, which is longer than we’d like – ideally it would not be recorded at all, or be deleted before 30 days, like Hide.me.

Psiphon also shares user information with advertisers and sponsors. They can see, for example, how often their sites are visited through Psiphon and from which countries. These are aggregated by date, sponsor, and region.

Psiphon does state that it will not give detailed or ‘potentially user-identifying information’ to partners or any other third parties, but we still don’t recommend it for privacy. With so many logs, Psiphon simply cannot be trusted to keep you private or anonymous.

In fact, Psiphon clearly states that its software should not be considered a privacy tool and, therefore, we don’t recommend it as one. Here are some privacy-friendly, no-logs VPNs you should consider instead.

To test Psiphon VPN’s speeds, we purchased its speed boost upgrade for $3.00 per month. Then we measured its speed performance by comparing our internet speeds before and after connecting to a VPN server.

Here’s how Psiphon SpeedBoost performed on a 100Mbps internet connection:

With SpeedBoost, we registered awful 62% speed loss on local connections. These service is incredibly slow, especially considering the price of a monthly subscription.

Psiphon simply isn’t intended to be used for HD streaming, torrenting, or gaming. It’s much too slow for these activities.

Unfortunately, we weren’t able to conduct our usual tests with Psiphon VPN because it doesn’t let you select a VPN server in a specific country. You’re randomly assigned a server, often based in Singapore even if you’re in a different continent altogether.

Psiphon Free Proxy Speed Tests

Psiphon Free is mind-numbingly slow, even for a free proxy service. In our tests, we measured a speed loss of 96%when connected to a nearby server in the US.

It’s clear from looking at these results that Psiphon throttles its free proxy servers.

These are literally the slowest out of the 55 VPN services we’ve reviewed. Put simply, Psiphon Free Proxy is too slow to use for almost anything.

There are free VPNs like PrivadoVPN Free and Proton VPN Free that have recorded speeds more than 10 times faster than Psiphon in our tests.

The fastest free VPN we’ve reviewed is AtlasVPN. It’s a good option for torrenting, has a private logging policy, and secure encryption.

Here’s a table listing which streaming service Psiphon unblocks:

Psiphon isn’t a reliable VPN for streaming. The VPN didn’t work with Netflix US, Dazn, or Disney+ in our tests.

While we were able to unblock BBC iPlayer using Psiphon Proxy Free, it took a very long time for the video to load due to slow speeds.

In Psiphon’s defense, the tool was never intended for bypassing streaming geo-blocks. However, we expect the best anti-censorship tool to be able to do so, just like we found while testing ExpressVPN.

Here’s a quick summary showing how Psiphon’s proxy and VPN compare for torrenting:

Torrenting Attribute	Psiphon Proxy	Psiphon VPN
Average Download Bitrate	9.9MiB/s	P2P Banned
Kill Switch	No	No
Port Forwarding	No	No

We don’t recommend Psiphon proxy or VPN for torrenting. Psiphon VPN completely blocks all P2P traffic, making it an awful VPN service for torrenting. We expect a good VPN to offer a selection of P2P-optimized servers and fast download speeds.

Psiphon’s proxy service doesn’t block P2P traffic and has a fast average bitrate of 9.9MiB/s. But Psiphon proxy doesn’t have the necessary features to keep your IP address hidden while torrenting. It doesn’t have a kill switch, port forwarding, and consistently leaks your DNS and WebRTC requests.

So even though its download speeds are fast, that’s definitely not a good enough reason to use its proxy for torrenting.

The privacy policy is intrusive, too. It logs your browsing activity, original IP address, and connection timestamps — making users identifiable if this information were leaked.

Psiphon simply doesn’t keep you safe or anonymous while torrenting and should be avoided. In stark contrast to Psiphon, the VPNs we recommend for torrenting have fast speeds, leak protection, no-logs policies, and an effective kill switch.

Other VPNs like Astrill will keep you anonymous while torrenting, preventing your ISP or other torrenters from seeing your true IP address.

Use the table below to find out which encryption ciphers, connections protocols, and security features Psiphon offers:

Psiphon VPN operates exclusively on L2TP/IPSec rather than our preferred protocol OpenVPN. It’s fairly secure when used in combination with AES 256-bit encryption, but it’s needlessly weaker than the competition.

Importantly, unlike the VPN app, Psiphon’s proxy service does not encrypt your internet traffic.

Psiphon’s proxies use SSH, SSH+ (obfuscated), and HTTP configurations. Because Psiphon’s main goal is to access blocked content through the SSH+ proxy service, its apps don’t provide many advanced privacy settings at all.

There’s no VPN kill switch, which would prevent your IP address from being exposed in the case of a connection drop.

Security Flaws & Independent Audit

While Cure53’s 2017 security audit of Psiphon revealed “no noteworthy security risks,” we did experience a few leaks during our testing which affected both the VPN and the proxy service.

Our tests of the Windows app revealed DNS request leaks. Previously, we also saw WebRTC leaks. Without a kill switch, the presence of leaks leaves your personal data entirely exposed to any snooping third parties.

You can see Psiphon proxy has DNS requests, WebRTC, and geolocation leaks during our testing in the picture below:

Only 16% of the 90 most popular free VPNs we’ve tested leak DNS requests like Psiphon. There are far more secure and private free VPNs available, and even cheap no-logs VPN like PrivateVPN.

In 2019, a follow-up audit of Psiphon’s apps by Cure53 had “mixed” results, with criticism of the Windows app in particular, stating:

Several parts of the application feel heavily outdated

In 2021, Psiphon recruited another auditor called 7ASecurity which provided a more positive assessment.

No Viruses, but Lots of Trackers & Permissions

Using VirusTotal, we scanned Psiphon’s app and found no malware or viruses.

However, we found over 20 intrusive permissions and trackers in the Psiphon Pro Android app. Combined with Psiphon’s invasive privacy policy, we simply cannot recommend the VPN and proxy service.

Two years ago, Psiphon’s proxy service reliably beat China’s Great Firewall. As of 2023, you won’t be able to connect to any servers with its proxy or VPN service from within China.

Psiphon warns users that the VPN configuration (L2TP, or Transport Mode) does not have strong censorship circumvention capabilities. Our test also confirmed that Psiphon VPN doesn’t work in China.

If you’re looking for a free VPN in China, Windscribe Free is a much more reliable choice that protects your data.

Psiphon’s proxy servers do provide additional layers of obfuscation (SSH+) to bypass online filters in other countries. While the SSH proxies do encrypt traffic, this encryption is limited to your browser traffic, leaving other apps unprotected.

Psiphon’s proxy service does provide a simple way for users to download VPN software from countries that block VPN websites and download pages. This is one of the reasons it’s so popular in countries like Iran.

To do this, users can send an email to get@psiphon3.com in order to receive the downloads and bypass government blocks. This is a good idea and something we haven’t seen before.

Overall, we don’t recommend using Psiphon if you’re in a country with online censorship. Using a proxy, and not a VPN, runs the risk of exposing your online activity to government agencies.

Psiphon’s customer support is very limited, even if you’re a paying customer. There is no live chat support, which is disappointing.

There are FAQs on the Psiphon website which cover basic troubleshooting issues, app compatibility, and a few other potential problems – but not much else. The user guide shows you how to use the Windows and Android apps.

The only way to contact the Psiphon support team is via the email address on its website. A few years ago, we would receive comprehensive responses through email, but recently our emails have gone unanswered.

For a VPN with so many complexities and features, combined with the high-stakes nature of bypassing government web filters, Psiphon must provide a better level of customer support.

Ideally Psiphon would have comprehensive walkthroughs, like those offered by Surfshark, or some sort of live chat help like the excellent NordVPN. Even a ticketed support system would be appreciated, rather than waiting for an email response that might never come.