#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW FOR FREE#
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW INSTALL#
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW FULL#
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW ANDROID#
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW SOFTWARE#

#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW FULL#

There’s more than enough bandwidth here for anything you’re likely to want to do online, and the Smart VPN option lets you specify individual applications or websites that should bypass the VPN and run at full speed.

#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW ANDROID#

It's not clear why this is our guess would be that the current release of the Android client still uses a regular IKEv2 VPN connection, rather than the super-fast Hydra protocol as on Windows.Įven so, we’ve no complaints about these speeds. Performance here wasn’t quite so impressive: using a London-based server we got download speeds of 179Mbits/sec, while the New York server gave us 123Mbits/sec.

We next tested the VPN on an Android-based Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 tablet. No doubt about it, Hotspot Shield on Windows is an exceptionally fast VPN. This time NordVPN was a hair faster, with a rate of 196Mbits/sec, but we’re more accustomed to seeing speeds of around 170Mbits/sec in this test. Predictably this was slower, but again only by a tiny margin – we measured transatlantic speeds of 195Mbits/sec. We then connected to a server in New York and repeated the test. That’s phenomenally good – the best speed we’d previously seen was 204Mbits/sec from NordVPN.īest VPN 2022: Secure your privacy with the most reliable VPNs for streaming and security Repeated the Google speed test showed that performance had fallen only very slightly, to 218Mbits/sec. We tested this using a Virgin Media fibre broadband connection without a VPN, this gave us an average download speed of 219Mbits/sec, according to the Google Speed Test tool.įor our first test, we installed Hotspot Shield on a Windows 11 laptop with default settings and connected to a server in the UK. Using a VPN always has an impact on the speed of your internet connection, but Hotspot Shield claims to be the fastest VPN around. READ NEXT: The best VPN services you can buy Hotspot Shield VPN review: Performance That’s not the lowest price we’ve seen – CyberGhost costs £68.25 for three years, while Private Internet Access is just £65 – but it’s still very reasonable. By far the best deal is a three-year subscription, which currently costs £96.84, or just £2.69 a month.

If you're willing to sign up for an annual subscription you can save quite a lot of money: that costs £83.88, equivalent to £6.99 monthly. Pricing starts at £10.99 a month, which removes all restrictions and adverts, allows you to choose from the full range of servers and lets you connect from up to five devices at once.

Only servers in the US are available to free users, you can only connect one device at a time, you’re limited to 500MB of data transfer per day, and you’ll also see adverts while browsing.Ī paid-for subscription gives a much better experience.

#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW FOR FREE#

You can actually use Hotspot Shield for free – but this comes with several limitations.

#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW INSTALL#

You can also install Hotspot Shield on macOS, iOS and Linux, along with Android and Amazon Fire TV systems – and if you have a compatible router you can also configure Hotspot Shield to protect all the devices on your network at once. A Kill Switch toggle suspends your internet connection if the VPN cuts out, and you can also turn leak prevention on and off – although it beats us why you’d ever want to disable it.Īside from a slight reorganisation of the elements, the Android edition looks very similar. A built-in speed tester lets you check the performance of your internet line, and in the Settings panel you can configure the VPN to run automatically whenever you’re connected to the internet, or when you connect to an unsecured wireless network. It’s a shame though that you can’t bookmark your favourite servers – the “Quick access” section only shows preselected options for gaming and streaming – and there’s also no indication of a server’s load or ping time shown until after you connect. You can connect or disconnect by clicking or tapping the big button in the middle of the window, while the location browser lets you choose from servers in more than 80 countries. The interface has been revamped several times in the past few years, and the latest release of the Windows client has a smart white-on-black interface, providing a wealth of connection information in a clean and accessible layout.

#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW SOFTWARE#

That’s not all the software has going for it. As we’ll see in our tests below, this innovation really does allow Hotspot Shield to race ahead of most competing VPNs. The publisher claims that this makes it the fastest VPN around, while still providing unbreakable security courtesy of 2048-bit RSA encryption. Most VPNs use standard connection protocols such as IKEv2 or Wireguard – but Hotspot Shield uses its own proprietary protocol, called Hydra.

Hotspot shield free vpn review