Are you tired of paying hefty subscription costs for using a VPN? You’ve come to the right place! Read this post to get the top 10 best Free VPNs you should try in 2023!
When you surf the internet, it’s important to make sure no one is watching over your shoulder. But hackers could be hindering your data without your knowledge, while your ISP and advertisers are certainly interested in similar activities. With a Virtual Private Network (VPN), you’re secure against a host of online threats.
With increasing cyber risks, the need for VPNs has expanded. Despite giving less protection, restricted server range, and bandwidth, free VPNs are highly popular. It is exactly why there are actually hundreds of free VPNs online.
But when there’s an unlimited supply of durable and sketchy VPNs, how do you decide which one to choose?
That’s the reason why the team at howtofirestick has done the hard work for you and discovered the top 10 best free VPNs you should try! But before moving further, let’s see why you should go for a free VPN.
Why Get a Free VPN in 2023?
The most obvious idea of targeting a free virtual private network (VPN) instead of a paid one, like NordVPN, is the cost variation.
After all, if you can get free anonymity as you surf the web or limited access media that your government agencies don’t usually permit, all without paying a cent, wouldn’t you?
It is good to go for a free VPN to understand if it performs for your requirements before buying a paid tier of service. Or you can utilize a free VPN for a very minor or small venture into private internet browsing.
It’s like when you need to unblock an episode of a TV program that is geographically restricted in your nation and don’t want to use the VPN after that.
Free VPNs are also beneficial for adding some security while perusing on free Wi-Fi: a risky gambit at best.
Moreover, free VPNs can fluctuate dramatically from the best to the most defective. So, keep reading this post to get the top 10 best free VPNs available in the market.
Top 10 Best Free VPNs to Try in 2023
Let’s explore the top 10 Best Free VPN that you can try in 2023!
1 Proton VPN
According to many testers and critics on the internet, the basic version of ProtonVPN has one of the best and most durable network performances, great speeds, endless free bandwidth, and supportive customer service. That is why Proton VPN is on the top of our list of top 10 best free VPNs.
In 2017, Proton VPN was developed by the same Swiss company behind the ProtonMail service, one of the most secure encrypted email services.
It was basically designed to protect journalists and activists from authoritarian administrations and let them interact safely. Under this same thought, the company formed a VPN directed to a broad privacy-minded public.
ProtonVPN is available in various forms and sizes, but there’s a free option as well.
The good news is that being a proactive safety and protection company, Proton Technologies is very honest and doesn’t offer advertisements or quietly trade users’ browsing records.
Therefore, ProtonVPN Free is subsidized by ProtonVPN paid users, and the group urges everyone to become a subscriber, specifically by upgrading to a paid and more comprehensive subscription plan.
Of course, it indicates that the free version is much more restrained than the others, bringing a server network comprised of only three nations, support for a single device, and an average connection speed.
Visit the Website Here Download the App2 Windscribe VPN
Windscribe is a newcomer in the VPN market, and the firm has got a lot of recognition lately. The basic free plan allows 10GB of data per month, though we have noticed promotions giving as much as 20GB regularly.
There are other techniques to obtain more data as well, like suggesting to a friend or tweeting about the service. If you refer someone and the person end up signing up for a paid subscription plan, Windscribe will upgrade your plan to an unlimited one as well. This is a great reward!
Just because it is free doesn’t indicate there are a lot of bumps when you think of safety and features. Windscribe doesn’t save connection logs, IP stamps, nor a record of the websites you browsed.
When you connect to a server, it gets your username, but once you terminate the session, the system deletes that information within just three minutes.
Windscribe has always been one of the preferred free VPNs. Compared to some other free services, Windscribe gives you something more – a big bucket of 10GB of data per month!
This is very impressive as Windscribe is working on encouraging people to choose its premium subscription plan.
Windscribe is among some of the few free VPNs that can successfully connect to USA Netflix or BBC iPlayer in the UK. It is a very big hit for Windscribe, which no other average free VPN providers can match.
If you desire free VPN streaming, Windscribe is the most reliable and safest option.
Visit the Website Here Download the App3 TunnelBear
TunnelBear is a Canadian firm established in 2011 that loves bears and handles clients in a fun, happy way.
Do you think we’re fooling you? No, TunnelBear lets clients pay for a subscription plan in jars of honey, for example.
This unique business service moves to TunnelBear’s customer – one of the smartest and most entertaining industries. For instance, transforming the world map into comic bear tunnels, which users can actually notice the cuddly animals going through when switching connections.
Similarly, with the VPN turned off, the users see a sheep at the user’s physical area as a signal to turn the security on to avoid becoming exposed.
The network of TunnelBear includes 23 countries, a restricted amount but is at least sufficient to make sure the furry buddies can enter Asia, Europe, Australia, and the Americas.
Moreover, the service has additional security traits: the so-called GhostBear masks VPN traffic as original, and VigilantBear prevents unsecured traffic whenever a Wi-Fi connection cuts.
This VPN utilizes OpenVPN TCP as the default protocol, but you can modify it to UDP by toggling off the “TCP Override” feature. However, it doesn’t run with Netflix, and torrenting support is also nearly useless in the free variant.
Even if TunnelBear has many great features, the users still have to deal with some limitations. This includes the transfer data being confined to 500MB per month and the number of connections being reduced to just one.
Visit the Website Here Download the App4 Hotspot Shield
Hotspot Shield free VPN is an excellent model of a free VPN service. There is a lot to love right out of the digital box, including a 500 MB daily data quantity.
Hotspot Shield has turned out to be one of the best free VPNs on our list of top 10 best VPNs due to its durable and safe VPN connections.
It offers great military encryption to defend your browsing activity. It didn’t cut or slow down during many tests even once and never leaked the IP address.
Hotspot Shield has a smooth and easy to use interface. It also has a no-logs policy, and it has good access to torrenting. The app service of this VPN is compatible with many devices and operating systems.
In fact, it has one of the best android applications, in our opinion.
It also gives a kill switch option to defend your identification in case of an internet crash and offers five concurrent connections. Even if it’s famous for avoiding geo-restrictions on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and other streaming services, you won’t be able to run anything because of data limitations in the free version.
While the security of this VPN is good, and it has updated its no-logging policy, speeds can be slow at times, and the location limits restrictive.
Surely not the free VPN for fans of Indian Premier League cricket, but a great choice if you want security while streaming or performing online banking activities.
Visit the Website Here Download the App5 Hide.me
Hide.me free VPN gives you a choice to refill your free plan every month, so this VPN is basically free for life!
Hide.me is a great alternative to start experimenting with a free VPN to understand if it’s the best fit for you. It may not be the best choice for the people who want to connect to particular servers around the world or use a ton of data each month.
Talking about safety, this VPN comes with military-grade encryption and high-tech protocols in OpenVPN, WireGuard, and IKEv2. A connection-level and app-level kill switches are also available, just as SOCKS5 proxy and split tunneling.
These services will improve your torrenting experience, which should be much better than any other VPNs, thanks to relatively fast speeds. Of course, with a 10 GB data limit, you will not be utilizing P2P much.
Hide.me VPN is easy to navigate. There are customers for Windows, iOS, macOS, Amazon Fire TV & Fire Stick, and Android. You can also set it up on different operating systems such as Linux and other routers.
The main difference between a premium and free plan is that a free service provides one concurrent streaming while the premium lets you do it with ten.
Moreover, there aren’t any ads to go through at any point. Regardless of the operating system you utilize, Hide.me is smooth and slick. They offer 24/7 technical assistance for all their clients, also free ones.
Users who often travel outdoors with Android or iOS cell phones can decide which applications can or can’t work without connecting to the VPN. Now you won’t have to bother about your location or ISP getting traced while enjoying Spotify while jogging or hiking.
It’s best to consider Hide.me as the perfect option if you don’t want anyone to transfer your data to any advertisement company.
There are some free VPN alternatives in terms of download limitation and anchor server options, but very few offer privacy and anonymity better than Hide.me.
Visit the Website Here Download the App6 Speedify
Speedify, as its name implies, is a much faster VPN for usual browsing and small file downloads. You receive a 2 GB per month data usage, which is comparatively low but not as low as other free VPNs in the market.
These are the reasons Speedify is in our list of top 10 best free VPNs in the market.
It supports regular browsing speed by utilizing the best available web connections depending upon your anchor point. Speedify also works with “turbocharging” technology. It enhances the performance even further. But, the technical specifics are a bit hard to manage.
It comes with the latest channel bonding technology. It uses various VPN protocols to increase connection speed over different internet connections simultaneously.
The free variant of this VPN gives high speeds because of some selected servers in their group. You have data limitations with this VPN also.
Speedify is not always an excellent option for streaming – this is partly due to the data allowance. Still, there’s something about its servers that makes it pretty bad for transporting streaming content from one server to another.
Speedify is also a much reliable option when it comes to safety. Though, Windscribe is a bit better on that aspect. Eventually, Speedify is an ideal option if you mostly need to use a VPN for individual browsing and aren’t concerned with torrenting or streaming programs from other nations.
Overall, Speedify is a trustworthy VPN service with 200+ servers in 35 nations, which is suitable for basic usage. However, for heavy usage, you should look for a better option.
Visit the Website Here Download the App7 Avira Phantom VPN
The free variant of Avira Phantom VPN is an easy to use and simple VPN that offers a basic level of safety and good security. It is different from many second-rate free VPNs by its logging policy and secure AES-256 encryption service.
The Avira apps are available for macOS, iOS, Windows, and Android, all of which utilize the OpenVPN protocol. The exemption is the iOS application, which operates using IKEv2, a particularly fast protocol on mobile gadgets.
The speed of Avira Phantom Free is consistent: 70% of what you receive with the paid services. We marked an average speed reduction from 94Mbps to 60Mbps when connecting to Avira Phantom Free from one of the locations outside the country.
Sadly, the user experience is quite restricted. There is no kill switch available. The system connects the user automatically to the nearest VPN server with no option to pick a nation to connect to.
If you are in the UK, you can only connect to a UK server, and if you are in the USA, you’ll get connected to a USA server.
Apart from the lack of selection, this indicates you can’t utilize Avira Phantom Free to unblock geographically restricted content in other realms.
Visit the Website Here Download the App8 Opera VPN
Opera VPN is a completely free VPN built-in to the Opera web browser. Opera has been in the business since 1995 and is a popular web browser produced by Opera Norway AS.
This service provider has many useful features that differentiate it from other VPNs on the market. One of the most fantastic elements of this VPN is it is built into the Opera Browser itself.
That implies no complex setups or slow installation times. Simply log into the browser and starts browsing with security and ease. Secondly, just like Betternet, you can use OperaVPN free of cost.
Opera free web browser comes with a built-in VPN that hides your IP address as you surf the internet. You will have to allow the VPN in the browser settings.
Since it is a browser extension, your OperaVPN can’t guarantee any traffic blocking transmitted from other browsers or applications. So even if your browsing is secure, your emails and banking applications aren’t included.
In addition to its free VPN service, the browser emphasizes a built-in advertisement blocker and malware security. When you work with the browser, the VPN masks your identification for anonymous browsing – this is particularly helpful over free Wi-Fi networks.
You can pick from three virtual places: the Americas, Asia, and Europe.
Since you can’t choose particular servers within those countries, OperaVPN is not the best choice for streaming. However, The browser is available for all significant platforms.
Visit the Website Here Download the App9 Atlas VPN
Atlas VPN is apparently the first service provider in recent years to grab attention. Striving to become the best free VPN, it also intends to avoid handling ads and will live off premium variant users.
This service secures you on public Wi-Fis, where you’re most likely to utilize compact devices like a tablet or cellphone. This free and handy tool will make your connection secure with AES-256 encryption and IKEv2 tunneling protocol.
This VPN has secured its place in our top 10 best free VPNs list with such unique features.
Even if security isn’t your main concern, you can still make use of Atlas VPN. With this VPN, you’ll be able to unblock Netflix US and the Netherlands collections.
You’ll find it hard to get another free VPN that can do it. Even premium VPNs tend to venture when it comes to streaming. Despite the restrictions, speed is good, too, so HD streaming would be possible. However, 4K is only for premium customers.
Moreover, Atlas VPN supports torrenting and is secure enough to defend your P2P traffic. Sadly, neither the SOCKS5 proxy nor port forwarding is possible.
Currently, Atlas VPN supports Android, Windows, and iOS as of August 2020. After that, you can expect a macOS application as well. Some stories state the Chrome browser extension is under development at the moment.
Atlas VPN provides excellent service with no disguised charges. That has its cost, though – you will have a speed cap and only three locations to pick from. For $4.99, you can exclude the cap and access servers in all 17+ realms. Lastly, premium users also get 24/7 email support.
Visit the Website Here Download the App10 Zoog VPN
ZoogVPN allows a server network of 28 nations and over 50 spots, numbers that are more than enough to guarantee worldwide coverage at quick speeds.
But there’s something more to this provider than its VPN service, as it features multi-platform support for up to five devices, many VPN protocols, 256-bit encryption, support for P2P in some selected locations, and much more.
The most prominent trait is perhaps in the pricing section: not only does ZoogVPN give one of the best prices in the market, but it also offers a free plan intended to show all clients the advantages of a paid subscription plan.
The good news is there is no time limit to their free plan, but as anticipated, there are some other limitations. The users of this VPN can access only three locations (one of which is P2P supportive).
Free users can install the software on a single device. Also, the data limit is a maximum of 2GB per month, and connection protocols are reduced to the ones using 128-bit encryption.
ZoogVPN presents users with multiple encryption protocols. Free users can decide between IKEv2 and OpenVPN, with premium users having extra protocols they can pick from.
But for most users, OpenVPN and IKEv2 serve, as these are very suitable protocols for safety and speed. ZoogVPN works on Mac and Windows, as well as on Apple and Android gadgets.
When examining the free app of ZoogVPN, we found it has a kill switch functionality! This is a service you can turn on and off, and it guarantees that the system suspends all web traffic whenever the safe VPN connection suddenly drops.
Visit the Website Here Download the AppRisks of Free VPNs
The reason why people opt for services that allow free trials or limited variants of comprehensive services is simple. Because otherwise, unreliable companies might mislead customers. Some VPN apps gather data about their users to trade online, which can have all kinds of harmful outcomes.
Not only will the user’s private information fall into the hands of anonymous third parties, but often your banking details can also be jeopardized.
Some companies make use of limited free trials to cheat their users into investing in an updated plan that can cost the user a fortune. They do it without any notice which is more serious. Plus, the uninstall method of such rogue apps is often complex.
The VPN services that we recommend here monetize their free services by restricting the available choices. So, the clients may ultimately upgrade to paid subscriptions.
Wrapping Up
There are only a few really good free VPNs that provide service without negotiating on your safety, imposing small data caps, or seizing your device.
Unlike premium VPNs, there is no free VPN that has everything. But there are still good free VPNs in the market, with lots of options based on what you need to do.
Free VPNs are ideal when you only wish to use them infrequently and don’t require too much data. For example, a free VPN helps you quickly want to avoid an IP address (geo-) block.
However, when you start working with a free VPN for Netflix or other streaming platforms, you might get into trouble with data limits and speed caps.
Similarly, you’ll have limitations when you attempt to download TV shows and films with a free VPN version. In such instances, you’ll be much better off with a paid VPN subscription.
Please remember that the crucial part of getting a free VPN is doing analysis and not always hoping for the first result in the app store to be the best. We hope that our list of top 10 best free VPNs will help you pick the one that suits your needs when you think of trying a free VPN for your device.
If you want premium services related to your privacy, we recommend you read our article on the Best VPNs in the market.
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