IVPN Review

After analyzing its privacy policy, we are confident that IVPN is a true no-logs VPN. This ensures that what you do while connected to IVPN remains private as it doesn’t store any data that could link your online activities back to you.

IVPN is one of only 12 VPNs that have a true no-logs privacy policy, and one of only a couple to have had it verified by a third party. Even many of the most popular top VPNs, including NordVPN and ExpressVPN, collect some user logs.

IVPN further backs up its no-logging claims by publishing a transparency report. This report shows how often it receives requests for personal data of its users from law enforcement and other third parties. But because IVPN doesn’t store this type of information, we saw that it has never complied with these kinds of requests.

We love that IVPN goes the extra mile by accepting cash payments and even letting you sign up for an account without an email address. That way, not only can your online activity not be traced back to you, but there’s no way of knowing you’re even an IVPN user.

When signing up using this method, we were given an anonymous account ID rather than the usual email address and password.

Surprisingly given its privacy-focus, IVPN does not use diskless VPN servers. These servers, used by PIA, Windscribe, and most of the top VPN services, don’t contain storage drives, which means their data gets wiped every time they’re powered down.

IVPN declined to answer when we asked if it plans rolling these servers out in the future.

IVPN has stated its service is not focused on streaming, so we weren’t surprised to find we couldn’t access geo-blocked content while connected to the VPN.

The VPN has failed to access major streaming sites, including BBC iPlayer and Disney+, over years of testing, despite us trying multiple servers. Even some free VPNs, like Windscribe, manage to access these platforms regularly.

In a recent test, IVPN did unblock US Netflix, but only after several attempts and connections to specific servers (Ashburn and Chicago). This inconsistency shows that IVPN is unreliable for regular streaming needs.

Using IVPN, we successfully streamed Ordinary World on US Netflix.

To access local streaming sites while keeping all of our other traffic encrypted, we set up split tunneling to exclude the streaming website or app from the VPN tunnel. However, this feature wasn’t available on Mac or iOS, meaning we had to disconnect from the VPN entirely.

To add further frustration, IVPN doesn’t have apps for streaming devices, like Fire TV, Android TV, or Apple TV.

As our data shows, IVPN is consistently fast across every location without any significant outliers. The slowest server was Australia, with a 22% reduction in speed, but this is to be expected due to the distance between the server and our location in the US.

To put it into context, IVPN was the 25th fastest VPN we tested on local connections and the 21st on international connections, which is slightly above average.

Though it was faster than PIA, CyberGhost, and many other popular VPNs, it fell short of the very fastest, such as Hotspot Shield. This VPN posted a maximum download speed loss of just 0% in every server location.

While fast download speeds are ideal for streaming geo-blocked HD or 4K video, IVPN is blocked from most of these services. As a result, its impressive speed felt underutilized when only used for everyday web activities.

We found IVPN has the third-fastest local ping times out of any VPN. At just 5ms on a local connection, it has lower latency than other high-quality VPNs like NordVPN and PIA.

This low latency means that while protecting our IP address from DoS attacks in fast-paced games like CS:GO, we experienced no noticeable difference in the game’s FPS or the precision of enemy character’s hitboxes.

The added latency was only an issue when we connected to countries like Brazil for easier gaming lobbies. However, IVPN’s ping time of 114ms in Brazil was comparable to other VPNs when connected to servers in that region.

IVPN has servers in countries with easier gaming lobbies, like Brazil.

Using Wireshark while connected to IVPN, we analyzed our network traffic to assess the strength of its encryption. We were impressed with what we saw.

By default, the VPN uses WireGuard with ChaCha20. You can switch to OpenVPN with AES-256 in the app’s settings, but we recommend sticking with the defaults as they’re more modern and just as secure.

IVPN successfully encrypted our network connection.

Regardless of which option you choose, no one will be able to intercept what you’re doing online.

In our tests, IVPN did not leak our IP or DNS address both when our connection dropped (thanks to its kill switch) and during standard browsing (thanks to its built-in IP and DNS leak protection).

As a result, our true IP address was never exposed to the websites we were visiting and our browsing activity was not visible to our ISP.

IVPN’s leak protection worked perfectly in our tests.

Disappointingly, IVPN’s kill switch feature is only available on Windows, macOS, and Android. After discovering that the built-in iOS kill switch leaks some traffic to Apple’s servers, IVPN decided to completely remove it in August 2023.

However, we’d have preferred it if the VPN service could have also labeled this in the app and allowed users to choose whether they trusted Apple or not.

Thankfully, all of IVPN’s apps include IP and DNS leak protection.

Rarely for a VPN service, we were also able to inspect and scrutinize IVPN’s codebase as it has made all of its apps open-source. You can go to GitHub and read all of the documentation yourself.

By giving access to the code base, IVPN is being very transparent to how its VPN clients work, and how they safeguard privacy and security. This is a great move from IVPN, and we wish more VPN services would follow its lead.

During our initial review of IVPN in 2019, we complained about the VPN’s limited server network. Disappointingly, the VPN has made minimal progress in this area, providing access to just 1 additional country.

In the same time period, Proton VPN has added servers in 58 more countries, while Surfshark has expanded its network to include 33 additional countries.

We’re pleasantly surprised to see 12 server locations spread across the US.

On the flip side, there’s only one server location in Australia. We expect to see servers on both coasts, so we hope to see servers in Perth added soon. For this reason, Australian readers should consider using NordVPN, instead.

Also, IVPN provides just one server in South America (Brazil), and three servers in East Asia (Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong).

You can connect to a country either by searching for it directly or finding it in the alphabetical list.

The VPN service offers three to five IP addresses per server. This equals a range of IP addresses between 228 and 380.

When installing IVPN on macOS, we had to make sure to select the correct app version: Intel or Apple Silicon. Unlike most VPNs that offer a ‘Universal App’ that works for both, IVPN keeps these versions separate, which is slightly more inconvenient.

The download and installation process was longer than expected, as the IVPN app is twice the size of many other VPNs we’ve installed, such as ExpressVPN and PIA.

Frustratingly, logging in required entering our random 12-digit account ID instead of an email address or password. While this is manageable initially, it became cumbersome by the time we installed it on multiple devices.

Despite its strong reputation in the cybersecurity community, we think IVPN is particularly well-suited for beginners.

Its apps are easy to use and visually appealing. To connect to a server, you just have to toggle the ‘On’ button, which always connected us to a nearby server in less than a second.

The app appears designed to run in the background rather than being frequently interacted with. It emphasizes the Network Protection feature, which automatically connects to a VPN server when joining an untrusted WiFi network.

While using the app directly, we immediately noticed how limited the home screen was. It only shows the connect button and the Multi-hop feature, which is unavailable on the Standard IVPN plan. We’d prefer it if this space offered more practical options, such as accessing a favorite server.

The apps have a consistent design across desktop and mobile, making it easy to remember how to perform specific tasks. Even with its similar design, we found it to be well-designed and easy-to-use from a small phone screen all the way to a large PC monitor.

For the most part, IVPN provided a seamless experience, operating quietly in the background with minimal impact on our browsing activity.

However, for times that required interaction with the app, we were often left frustrated. One recurring issue was the need to manually toggle the VPN connection on, even after selecting the server location. This extra step felt redundant and inconvenient, especially when we were in a hurry.

IVPN was a pleasure to use all day, every day.

Another issue was the app’s tendency to log us out regularly. This is particularly frustrating since the app requires an account ID rather than an email address for login.

In our P2P tests, we saw minimal drops in speed when torrenting while connected to a local server. Without the VPN connected, we could download a 20GB movie in 32 minutes. While connected to a IVPN US server, it took us 35 minutes to download the same file.

We were able to download a torrent file very quickly using IVPN on a UK server.

Strangely, the VPN requests that users don’t connect to its US servers while torrenting as it says its server providers threatened to disconnect its servers if it continued to receive DMCA notices. However, we were still able to download as usual while connected to all of its US server locations.

Rather than telling users to avoid certain servers, we wish IVPN would get around this limitation by owning its entire server network in the US, like IPVanish.

Similarly to Mullvad, IVPN has recently removed its port forwarding feature, citing “large scale abuse” after an influx of new customers began using the service.

Since the removal, we’ve noticed a slight decrease in the number of peers we can connect to, leading to somewhat slower and less reliable torrent download speeds.

If you’re looking for a VPN that offers port forwarding, Proton VPN, PIA, and AirVPN are good options.

IVPN is one of only four VPNs in our top 25 that doesn’t offer a dedicated app for streaming devices like Fire TV and Android TV. Instead, IVPN provides instructions for setting it up indirectly on Fire TV using the OpenVPN app and configuration files.

After following this method, we thought it was far too complex for most users, especially compared to using a VPN with a dedicated app.

To use the VPN on devices that don’t support VPN apps, you can set it up on a number of compatible routers, including DD-WRT, pfSense and Tomato. However, this process is also complicated and we don’t recommend it for beginners.

IVPN’s Windows, Linux, and Android app allow split tunneling, which is a handy feature if you only want to route some of your traffic through a VPN server. We used this on our Android device to encrypt traffic from all of our apps but maintain access to our local Netflix library.

You can choose to either include or exclude all apps in the VPN by default. We strongly recommend the former to reduce the risk of leaks due to misconfiguration.

IVPN’s split tunneling can be easily configured to either exclude or include apps from the tunnel.

Of all 16 VPNs that provide an ad blocker, IVPN AntiTracker’s blocked the most ads, preventing 100% of intrusive ads when used in ‘Hardcore Mode’. It also scored higher than PIA Mace for social trackers, but less when it came to analytic trackers.

Importantly, though, IVPN’s Hardcore Mode blocks some legitimate sites entirely, including Google and YouTube. In everyday use, we tended to prefer an ad blocker that blocked slightly fewer ads but still allowed us to use the web as we normally would.

IVPN’s desktop apps include Obfsproxy, which is a form of obfuscated server that’s designed to allow users in restrictive regions to access the internet.

Though this is likely to be sufficient to bypass censorship in countries like Russia and Turkey, our testing found IVPN does not bypass the Great Firewall of China. It failed to even connect to any servers.

Here’s a video of us trying and failing to connect to a VPN server in China:

Additionally, Obfsproxy drastically slows down internet speeds, dropping ours by 45%. It’s best suited for accessing blocked text-based apps, like X and WhatsApp, rather than heavy media apps like YouTube or Instagram.

IVPN’s Multi-hop feature offers an extra layer of security by rerouting your connection through multiple servers in different countries. This means that even if the exit server were to be compromised, your online activity remains private. However, this feature is only available to those who pay for the more expensive ‘Pro’ plan.

IVPN doesn’t include many additional features we’d expect to see from a top VPN. Here are the two we we missed the most while using it: