ExpressVPN Review

ExpressVPN’s offers three subscription plans:

If you only want to test ExpressVPN or use it for a one-time thing, the 1-month plan for $12.95 should be good enough. The most popular plan is for 12 months. It’s billed every year and costs only $8.32 per month. The six-month plan is billed, unsurprisingly, every six months. It costs $9.99 per month.

As mentioned, all plans offer a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Something noteworthy about ExpressVPN compared with other VPN vendors is the large number of payment options you have. Aside from the usual credit card and PayPal options, there’s BitCoin, WebMoney, and more.

ExpressVPN has more than 3000 VPNs server in 160 locations, spread across 94 countries. This is a very large server coverage that encapsulates most of the world.

Europe has 48 server locations, the Asia Pacific region has 27, and the Middle East alongside the African region has 5 server locations.

The good thing about having many servers and, therefore, plenty of IP addresses, is that even if a premium streaming service bans some of them, you’ll still have a lot of backup plans to go with.

I get it, slow connection speeds are frustrating! So it’s important for you to get the fastest server possible for your location. With ExpressVPN, there’s a nifty Speed Test option available to help you select the best server.

First, let’s quickly go through how to use the Speed Test feature in ExpressVPN. Note that this is available only in Windows and macOS applications.

1. Go to Speed Test from the menu.

2. Select your preference from “All locations” or “Recommended Locations” and click Run Test.

You can rank the server locations in terms of latency and download speed. The ranking score is shown as the “Speed Index.”

Let’s check the speed with some servers using speedtest.net. This is my normal internet connection speed before connecting to any VPN server:

• Ping – 2 ms
• Download speed – 78.55 Mbps
• Upload speed – 59.47 Mbps

Here are the figures when I connect to the best server for me, as recommended by ExpressVPN:

• Ping – 31 ms
• Download speed – 61.02 Mbps
• Upload speed – 66.00 Mbps

Now let’s compare the figures when I connect to other servers…

United States

• Ping – 157 ms
• Download speed – 65.22 Mbps
• Upload speed – 66.04 Mbps

United Kingdom

• Ping – 41 ms
• Download speed – 42.23 Mbps
• Upload speed – 57.18 Mbps

Australia

• Ping – 325 ms
• Download speed – 57.55 Mbps
• Upload speed – 46.86 Mbps

Germany

• Ping – 31 ms
• Download speed – 61.02 Mbps
• Upload speed – 66.00 Mbps

ExpressVPN says they won’t collect any logs of your activity, including browser history, destination of your internet traffic, data content, or any DNS queries. Connection logs, IP address, outgoing VPN IP address, connection timestamp, and even session duration aren’t stored.

ExpressVPN collects four kinds of information:

• Personal information — including your name, email address, and payment info — to administer your account and subscription
• Information about usage statistics, to provide customers a better service
• Anonymous crash reports and usability diagnostics
• IP addresses to authorize Media Streamer of the users who use the MediaStreamer

Encryption and Protocols

ExpressVPN encrypts all internet traffic to prevent prying eyes — whether from the government, or ISPs, or other third parties — from reading your data.

It uses AES-256 (Advanced Encryption Standard), the most recognized encryption around. This is used not only by security professionals all across the globe, but also the United States government itself. With a 256-bit key encryption, there are 2^256 combinations possible. So, it’s virtually impossible for hackers to crack their way through to you with a brute force attack.

To implement such strong encryption, ExpressVPN also puts in place a range of VPN protocols. Although it’s set to automatically use the best possible protocol by default, you can always choose a different protocol if you prefer. You’ve got several options: two OpenVPN options (UDP and TCP), IKEv2, and L2TP/ IPsec.

To select a protocol other than the automatic option recommended by ExpressVPN, do the following:

• Go to Options (as outlined in previous steps above).
• Go to the Protocol tab and select the protocol you prefer.

And that’s it!

ExpressVPN offers excellent customer support. For example, the live chat is available 24 hours every day. A knowledgeable staff member will help you with any issues you have.

After receiving support, you’ll be asked to complete a small feedback survey to rate the support and provide comments (if you have any).

I contacted the customer service team to find out whether ExpressVPN supports Tails Operating System. The operator was friendly and professional, quickly providing me with a link to their review of the Tails OS.

Apart from the live chat, there are two other options you can use for ExpressVPN support.

When I purchased ExpressVPN for the first time, I couldn’t download it and had some issues regarding my account. Fortunately, the Support team quickly transferred my money back, and I was able to purchase another subscription fairly easily.

All of ExpressVPN’s applications are easy to use — even if you’re a novice user.

You’ve already seen almost all desktop interfaces, so now let’s check out some of the important ones for the mobile app.

Android

The interface to select a suitable location is very straightforward. I love how uncluttered everything is. The main menu’s and the settings menu’s interface is intuitive as well.

As you can see, it’s quite easy to use the mobile version of the ExpressVPN app, too.

The iOS version looks and feels almost identical to the Android one, as such, I decided not to make separate screenshots for iOS.

Features and Allowances

IP-Address Masking and Shared IPs

With a shared IP, an encrypted connection or tunnel is created with your device and the internet at endpoints. In this tunneling process, your IP address is masked with that of the VPN’s IP address. This IP address is shared with other ExpressVPN users, too, which makes it impossible for anyone — including those with malicious intent — to trace you.

Your location, identity, and internet activity will be protected, as the VPN will scramble your device’s IP address.

Split Tunneling

The split tunneling feature (available for Windows, macOs, Android, and routers) enables you to route some internet traffic through a normal internet connection, and other traffic through an encrypted, VPN tunnel. This allows you to use the VPN tunnel only for the traffic you need to protect.

Now, why not route all traffic through a secure tunnel all the time? Well, you may run into situations where you’re not allowed to access foreign servers along with local internet services at the same time, or access Local Area Network devices when connected to the VPN.

Also, split tunneling may be useful in speeding up your connection, as transmitting all your data through a VPN tunnel may use up excessive amounts of your bandwidth.

ExpressVPN offers two split tunneling options:

• Split Tunneling. This protects all devices and applications that are connected without the ones that are specifically excluded.
• Inverse Split Tunneling. This protects only specifically selected devices and applications, while the ones not selected will run without the VPN.

Here’s how to activate split tunneling in ExpressVPN:

1. Go to Preferences (Options on Android).

2. Enable split tunneling.

3. Click on Settings. If you prefer to enable split tunneling, choose “Do not allow selected apps to use the VPN.”

4. But if you prefer to enable inverse split tunneling, choose “Only allow selected apps to use the VPN.”

Kill Switch

Users serious about VPN connectivity will be happy to know that ExpressVPN has one of the finest kill switches around. They just call it a “network lock.” When your VPN connection fails, the network lock ensures that your privacy is safe by stopping all internet traffic until the connection is restored.

Here’s how to enable the network lock-in ExpressVPN:

1. Go to Preferences (Options on Windows/Android).

2. Tick the Network Lock options.

Obfuscated Servers

Certain countries block VPN traffic. This is when obfuscated servers come in handy when trying to purchase a VPN.

ExpressVPN provides several obfuscated servers. And fortunately, obfuscation is already enabled! No additional configuration on your part is required.

If you reside in a country that blocks VPN traffic, you’ll have to use designated servers for that country. So for example, if you live in China, you’ll have to use designated servers for China users. If you don’t know the exact servers, you can always ask the support team.

Simultaneous Connections

One of the many benefits of an ExpressVPN subscription is that it lets you use the VPN in however many devices you want. But the catch is that you can connect to only up to five devices simultaneously.

If you have more than five devices to connect to, then it’s best to install ExpressVPN on the router you’re using.

Getting Started with ExpressVPN

If you’ve decided to sign up for ExpressVPN, the first step is to purchase a subscription. You’ll need to provide your name, email address, and credit card details.

Then follow these steps:

1. Sign in to your account at https://www.expressvpn.com/sign-in

2. Download the application for your platform. For demonstration purposes, I’ll use Mac.

3. After installing, you’ll need to sign in and activate the account with the activation code.

4. Then connect to a server.

Final Thoughts

ExpressVPN is undoubtedly the best VPN there is. The only drawback is its higher price. But we’re confident you’ll find that it’s a worthwhile investment.

If you have any questions or comments, please leave them in the comments section below.