5 Cheap VPNs with Amazing Performance

Let’s be honest, price is important.

Sure, it shouldn’t be your #1 criteria when choosing a VPN, but we know that all things being equal, it’s always better to get the best deal possible. Fortunately, saving money doesn’t mean you have to skimp on features.

The truth is…

There are several low-cost VPN providers that outperform their higher-priced competitors.

So we made it our mission to separate the excellent from the mediocre and show you which cheap VPNs are really the best value (and which one’s are just plain cheap).

Top Ranked Cheap VPN Providers

Rank	Company	Refund Policy	Best Offer	Details
1		7 Days	$3.33	Visit Site Read Review
2		30 Days	$4.00	Visit Site Read Review
3		15 Days	$4.08	Visit Site Read Review
4		N/A	$4.16	Visit Site Coming Soon
5		7 Days	$4.83	Visit Site Read Review

Criteria we considered:

To make it onto our list, VPNs had to perform above average (or better) in the following areas:

• Security – We only considered companies with solid security settings (128-bit AES or stronger, No activity logs, and preferably IP leak protection).
• Features – Some ‘low-cost’ VPN providers only offer the bare minimum of features. This list features companies that go the extra mile to provide useful tools their customers love (Tons of server locations, unblocking technology, torrent-friendliness, custom software)
• Speed – If you aren’t first you’re last. (said Ricky Bobby) And we like things that go fast. Really fast.
• Price – We only considered VPN providers that offered 1-year subscriptions for less than $5/month ($60/year)

Private Internet Access (from $3.33/month)

Private Internet Access

Private Internet Access is p2p/torrent friendly, and even includes a SOCKS5 proxy server in the Netherlands which can be used with Vuze, uTorrent, qBittorrent, etc.

Speeds are solid, and well above average compared to similarly priced competitors. Check out our review for full PIA speedtests.

Pricing

Private Internet Access is $6.95/month for a month-to-month subscription, or you can lock in their best price of $3.33/month if you buy a 1-year plan. All subscriptions include unlimited data, unlimited bandwidth/speeds, 5 simultaneously connected devices, and a 7-day 100% refund guarantee.

NordVPN (as low as $4/month)

NordVPN also belongs to the same select ‘Zero-Log’ club as Private Internet Access. Based in Panama (a privacy haven), they’re an excellent option for users who are extremely privacy-conscious. In theory, NordVPN’s servers should be even safer from NSA or five-eyes surveillance than US-based VPN providers like PIA, IPVanish, and SlickVPN.

Best Features

NordVPN is an excellent choice general security, video streaming (Netflix, iPlayer, Hulu), or p2p/filesharing. They’re one of the only VPN providers that is currently able to circumvent the Netflix VPN ban. It also works great with iPlayer, and has become extremely popular with British ex-pats.

Like PIA, NordVPN includes free SOCKS5 proxy service, in over 10 server locations, which is a nice bonus.

Caveats

The only complaint we have about NordVPN is their service is a bit slow compared to higher-priced competitors like IPVanish. It’s still fast enough for HD-video streaming (so most people won’t care) but don’t expect 50mbps+ speeds.

Pricing

NordVPN is $8/month if you prefer a month-to-month subscription, but you can save a full 50% when you buy a 1-year plan, which works out to a mere. $4/month.

All plans included unlimited bandwidth and data transfer. You also get full access to all NordVPN servers and locations (there aren’t any ‘tiers’). Best of all, NordVPN has an industry-leading 30-day 100% refund policy if you aren’t fully satisfied.

Invisible Browsing VPN ($3.08+/month)

Invisible Browsing VPN (IBVPN) is one of the few providers that bundles SmartDNS service and VPN service together at one low price. They actually have plans starting as low as $3.08/monthly (with a 1-year subscription) but the best value is actually the ‘Ultimate’ package which includes SmartDNS, Exclusive ‘Ultimate-only’ servers, P2P/torrents allowed, and 3 simultaneous connections. (The lower-priced plans only allow 1 connection at a time).

IBVPN has custom VPN apps for all major platforms including: Windows, Mac, iOS, Android. It also can be easily configured to work your home wifi router to create a dedicated VPN router.

Related: See our list of the Best Routers for VPN

Best Uses

IBVPN is best suited for general security or video streaming uses (unblocking geo-restricted sites). Their included ‘SmartDNS’ service makes it possible to access services like Hulu, BBC iPlayer, and Netflix from anywhere in the world.

They also allow p2p/filesharing but since they aren’t a true ‘Zero-Log’ provider, we’d recommend Private Internet Access instead if that’s your primary motivation for purchasing a VPN.

Pricing

IBVPN’s lower-end packages (servers restricted to a single geographic region) start as low as $3.08/month but the best deals are definitely the ‘Total’ or ‘Ultimate’ plans, which include access to servers in all 43 countries.

Here’s the pricing for most expensive ‘Ultimate’ package

• 1 month – $10.95/month
• 1 year – $4.84/month

They even offer an unrestricted 6-hour free trial of their VPN service (including SmartDNS). All plans come with their 15-day 100% refund policy.

PureVPN ($4.16/month)

PureVPN does alot of things well, but they are best known for two things:

1. Having more server locations than any other VPN (140 countries and counting)
2. Split-Tunneling feature (choose which apps use the VPN and which don’t)

If server variety is important to you, you can’t do better than PureVPN. They have over 500 servers in their global network in 141 countries (few other VPNs have more than 50).

PureVPN has really beefed up security in their VPN software, and their custom client includes impressive features like:

• Custom encryption settings
• Triple IP-leak protection (DNS Leaks, Kill-Switch, IPv6)
• Private DNS servers (don’t let your ISP see your web history)
• NAT Firewall (prevent unauthorized access to your computer)

Best Uses

With 256-bit OpenVPN encryption, split-tunneling, and 140 country locations, PureVPN is an excellent option for video-streaming, or general VPN security. The split-tunneling feature is extremely handy for people who only want a few apps/programs to use the VPN tunnel (you can specify the apps you want).

PureVPN technically ‘allows’ torrenting, but we don’t recommend using them for that purpose, and they’ve been known to block/cancel accounts for unauthorized filesharing.

Pricing

Normally priced at $9.95/month, you can save over 50% and pay $4.16/month if you choose a 1-year subscription.

All subscriptions come with unlimited bandwidth/transfer and 5 simultaneously connected devices. PureVPN also has a 7-day refund window, so you can try their service virtually risk-free.

Which cheap VPN provider to choose?

If you’re a bit overwhelmed with the sheer number of VPN’s to choose from, we’re here to help. The easiest way to choose a VPN provider is first to consider your reason for buying a VPN (the intended usage) and then select a VPN provider that excels in that area.

Here are our recommendations for affordable VPN providers, sorted by usage.

Cheap VPNs for Media Streaming (Netflix, Hulu, iPlayer)

For video streaming/geo-unblocking, you need a fast VPN service that isn’t easily blocked or fooled by geo-restriction technologies. Many of the best VPNs in this category are some of the less well-known ones (because they haven’t made it onto Netflix’s ‘blocked VPNs’ list.

Our top picks:

1. NordVPN (Confirmed working with Netflix, iPlayer)
2. VPN.AC (Works with iPlayer, Netflix)
3. PureVPN (Offers dedicated IP’s which work with Netflix)

The Best Cheap VPNs for Torrents/P2P

Torrenting and file-sharing is a high-security activity that is best done with a high privacy, zero-log VPN service. All of the VPNs recommended below keep zero logs and allow torrents. Some even include SOCKS5 proxy service, which can easily used to hide your IP address in your favorite torrent client.

Recommended VPNs for Torrenting:

1. Private Internet Access – Zero logs, SOCKS5 proxy included
2. Torguard – Zero logs, SOCKS5 proxy available separately
3. NordVPN – Zero logs, SOCKS5 proxy servers included (multiple locations)

Wrap-up

There are plenty of good, CHEAP VPNs out there. Don’t be fooled into thinking you have to pay $10 or $20 per month to get a quality provider.

That said, there are plenty of crap VPN services out there too, so it’s best to stick to providers with a proven track record, custom software, and a reputation for privacy & security.

And remember, there’s a massive gap between the quality of cheap VPNs and ‘Free’ VPNs. If you aren’t paying for the product, you are the product, and we don’t want to BE the product when it comes to a service that’s supposed to provide privacy and security.

Here are some more articles you’ll find useful:

Rank	Company	Refund Policy	Best Offer	Details
1		7 Days	$3.33	Visit Site Read Review
2		30 Days	$4.00	Visit Site Read Review
3		15 Days	$4.08	Visit Site Read Review
4		N/A	$4.16	Visit Site Coming Soon
5		7 Days	$4.83	Visit Site Read Review