PureVPN Review

PureVPN has worked to improve its public image after years of criticism for its aggressive logging policy.

Despite saying all the right things on its website, the actual changes to its logging policy simply aren’t enough.

The PureVPN privacy policy does not mention any efforts to disconnect your account from this information. It is all linked directly to you.

If that seems like it collects a lot of information, that’s because it does. We believe the information is enough to link a PureVPN user to activity performed through the service.

Of course, you should never use a VPN for anything illegal. But if you live in a country where the authorities can demand access to your browsing data at any time, using PureVPN would not guarantee your anonymity.

PureVPN is based in the British Virgin Islands

PureVPN is legally based in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), after it moved from Hong Kong.

This was a good pro-privacy move as the BVI is one of the most private jurisdictions in the world, outside the reach of the 14 Eyes and authoritarian regimes.

We give credit to PureVPN for uprooting itself for privacy reasons.

PureVPN is fast. That’s the key takeaway here. We tested it on both short distance connections (within the UK, where we’re located), as well as to a variety of overseas servers.

The results surprised us. Historically PureVPN has lagged behind compared to its competitors, but recent speeds are quite impressive.

First, we recorded PureVPN’s speeds when connecting to a server in the same city as us (London, UK). Check out the results:

As a general rule, any VPN which costs you less than 10% of your connection speed is doing a good job.

The numbers we recorded show that PureVPN is fast enough to be left on 24/7 without you having to worry about noticeable slowdown.

Long-distance speed test results

PureVPN also performed surprisingly well on international connections. Take a look at the five countries we tested below:

Even when connecting to the far side of the world, PureVPN still managed to put up some very solid numbers in our testing.

Remember, we tested on a 100Mbps dedicated broadband line. If your internet connection is slower than that, then your speeds when using a VPN will also be slower.

That said, we feel confident that the effect PureVPN has on your connection will barely be noticeable. You can still stream, game, and use the web with it just like you normally would.

PureVPN has recently removed all its dedicated streaming servers. You now simply connect to a server in the region you require and begin streaming.

It’s mostly as simple as that. Every UK server we tried unblocked BBC iPlayer, but every US server did not unblock Netflix.

PureVPN is only capable of unblocking 4 Netflix libraries: Canada, Germany, Ireland, Italy.

Access to 4 libraries is decent, but there are better Netflix VPNs that can unblock many more Netflix regions.

PureVPN also works to unblock Amazon Prime Video and Hulu on its US servers.

However, the VPN doesn’t work with DAZN or HBO Max, so we recommend you use a VPN that definitely streams HBO Max, instead.

PureVPN is not a great VPN for torrenting for two reasons.

Firstly, not all PureVPN servers allow P2P traffic. Those that are optimized are marked, but there are large gaps left by a lack of torrenting-friendly servers.

For example if you live in the south of Africa, your nearest torrenting server is in Angola – potentially thousands of kilometers away. The same goes for if you’re in South-East Asia.

Secondly, there’s the issue of PureVPN’s logging policy. In a nutshell, we feel that PureVPN still logs too much information for torrenters to feel confidently anonymous.

Authorities could theoretically gain access to your:

• Days connected to PureVPN and for how long
• Total amount of data downloaded in that timeframe
• Country of residence and ISP

From those figures alone there is a distinct chance that you could be identified – particularly if you are with a smaller ISP or in a smaller country.

PureVPN also had issues with logging controversies in its past.

In October 2017 the FBI was able to identify an accused criminal suspect by matching the IP address of a PureVPN server with the suspect’s real IP address.

While we are by no means saying that they could repeat themselves, it simply adds to the risk you take if you torrent with PureVPN.

While it may have once done, PureVPN does not currently work in China. Even on the days where it does, it’s far too inconsistent to recommend.

In order to have a chance at connecting to the outside internet from within China, you’ll have to contact PureVPN’s customer support.

The support agent will then give you a comprehensive guide to setting up PureVPN for China. It can be a difficult process and involves a lot of manual configuration. Even then, PureVPN is not guaranteed to work in China.

Our extensive testing of VPNs from directly within China has found that only a handful maintained more than 50% up-time over the past year. If you live in China, or are planning to visit, then give yourself the best chance at bypassing the Great Firewall with our tried-and-tested best VPNs for China.

If you want to unblock the internet in other countries, like Russia, the UAE, or Turkey, then PureVPN is a solid choice. With such a large server network your speeds should hold up well. There are still better VPNs to choose from if you value consistency, though.

The redesign we mention in the section above isn’t purely cosmetic. PureVPN also completely changed its range of features and settings on its Windows desktop app.

There is now far less customization and connection options than before. For starters, the protocol list has been shrunk.

PureVPN lets you connect via four protocols: either IKEv2, IPSec (Mac and iOS only), OpenVPN (TCP or UDP), and WireGuard (Windows and Android only). Previously it offered a range of outdated and flawed protocols, so we’re glad to see them gone.

On the plus side, there’s an option to activate the internet kill switch. This is a very important advanced feature a VPN can offer. It prevents your real IP address from leaking if the VPN connection drops.

Also, Split tunneling is available on Windows and Android devices, which is good to see.

On the down side, port forwarding is not available on its standard payment plan. If you want to be able to port forward you need to pay an extra $0.99 per month. It’s such a useful feature for torrenters, capable of greatly increasing download speeds, that charging extra for it really is a shame.

We also ran a DNS leak test while connected. Our DNS was properly hidden. However, the DNS server it was replaced with was not owned by PureVPN. Support refused to clarify for us if PureVPN DNS servers are in use, or even exist, anymore.

PureVPN has decided to remove checkboxes and automatically enable 256-bit encryption and IPv6 leak protection. This works to increase the usability of the app for less experienced users, but experienced users who wan’t manual control may not appreciate this change. You can still select your preferred protocol, though.

PureVPN is not the most secure VPN on the market, but it gets the basics right. While we appreciate the simplifying of the apps by making features automatic, we’d like to see port forwarding included as part of the standard pricing plan.

PureVPN offers around-the-clock live chat support. You can speak to an agent at any time of day, seven days a week.

We’ve always found them to be polite and punctual, even if they aren’t the most knowledgeable. If you have a simple problem you should certainly be able to get it resolved, though.

This isn’t an issue, as PureVPN handles more complex issues via its huge selection of online guides.

Its selection of online resources is absolutely vast – it’s incredibly impressive. There are hundreds of step-by-step walkthroughs for every platform and process you could imagine.

There’s so much material that it almost seems impossible that you’d encounter a problem not already addressed (complete with images to help guide you).