How We Test VPNs: Our Review Methodology Explained

Every VPN review site has a ranking. Few explain where that ranking comes from. Here's ours — in full, including the parts that make some readers uncomfortable, like the fact that we earn affiliate commissions.

We Pay for Our Own Subscriptions

Before the methodology: we buy VPN subscriptions ourselves. No provider sends us a free account in exchange for a review. No partnership agreement comes with an expectation of favorable coverage.

That independence matters because VPN companies are not neutral parties. They have strong financial incentives to appear trustworthy, fast, and privacy-preserving — whether or not they actually are. When a reviewer accepts a free subscription or a flat placement fee, that conflict enters the review whether anyone admits it or not.

We don't accept either.

How the Score Works

Each VPN we review receives a score from 0 to 100, built from six criteria. The weights below reflect where real users actually get hurt by a bad VPN choice.

Scores are updated every six months — or sooner if a provider changes their infrastructure, pricing, or audit status in a way that materially affects the score.

Privacy & Security Testing (25%)

This is the heaviest criterion because it's the hardest to fake long-term and the most consequential when it fails.

What "no-logs" actually means. A VPN provider can claim no-logs in their marketing copy with no enforcement mechanism. We look for three things in order of weight: (1) an independent third-party audit of the no-logs claim, conducted by a firm with a verifiable reputation (KPMG, Cure53, Deloitte, and similar); (2) the jurisdiction of the legal entity — companies based outside the 5/9/14 Eyes intelligence-sharing alliances face fewer legal obligations to retain or share data; (3) the specific wording of the privacy policy, checked against what the provider actually logs.

Protocols. We verify which protocols are actually available — not just listed. WireGuard and OpenVPN are the baseline for serious users. Providers offering obfuscation protocols (V2Ray, Shadowsocks, Stealth modes) get credit in this category because obfuscation serves a legitimate privacy function for users on restrictive networks.

Kill switch and DNS leak testing. We run DNS leak tests via dnsleaktest.com on each platform we review and attempt to trigger the kill switch by forcibly disconnecting the VPN tunnel mid-session.

Speed Testing (20%)

Speed tests are where VPN review sites most commonly publish misleading numbers. A single test on a single server on a single afternoon tells you almost nothing.

Our process: 10 test runs per server location, conducted three times across a day (morning, afternoon, evening local time). Results are averaged. We test on servers geographically close to our test machine to isolate VPN overhead from network distance effects.

We report three numbers: download speed, upload speed, and latency. We also report speed retention — the percentage of baseline speed retained through the VPN tunnel — because a VPN tested on a 1 Gbps connection will look fast even if it drops 60% of your bandwidth.

Protocols tested: WireGuard (primary) and OpenVPN UDP. IKEv2 where supported.

Streaming Testing (20%)

Streaming unblocking ability changes. Providers that worked with Netflix US in January may not work in March. We test monthly.

Each test session uses a fresh IP address and a cleared browser cache. We test on both desktop browser and mobile app where the provider supports both. Results are logged as: Pass (content loads, geo-restricted library accessible), Partial (proxy error or intermittent), or Fail (blocked).

Services we test against: Netflix US, Netflix UK, Netflix Canada, Disney+, Hulu, BBC iPlayer, Amazon Prime Video.

We publish the date each result was last verified. If a result is older than 45 days, we flag it as pending re-test.

Price & Value Testing (20%)

We pull pricing directly from the provider's website at the time of review. Given that VPN providers change introductory pricing frequently, every review page displays a "prices verified on [date]" notice.

We compare three price points: monthly plan, one-year plan, and two-year plan. We note the renewal price separately from the introductory price — these differ significantly for most providers, and a "79% off" headline that doesn't show what you'll pay at renewal is misleading.

Money-back guarantee length and reported track record of actually honoring refunds factor into this score.

Usability & Support (10%)

We install and use each VPN on Windows and iOS as a minimum. Setup difficulty is rated from a beginner's perspective — the assumption is a user who has never set up a VPN before.

Simultaneous connection limits matter here. A VPN that limits you to five devices on a single subscription creates friction; one with unlimited connections removes it.

For support quality, we run at least one live chat session per review and log the response time and accuracy of the answer.

Transparency & Trust (5%)

This is the smallest weight, but it's the category that affects everything else. A provider that publishes audits, discloses ownership, and processes refunds without a fight earns trust with us — and, more importantly, with the users we're recommending them to.

We note when a provider has no independent audit, when ownership is obscured through corporate structures, or when the provider has a documented history of ignoring refund requests. These don't automatically disqualify a VPN, but they reduce the trust score.

Our Update Schedule

Affiliate Disclosure

We earn a commission when you buy a VPN through links on this site. That commission does not change which VPNs we recommend or where they rank.

The scoring criteria and weights on this page govern every ranking we publish. A provider cannot improve their position by paying us, offering a higher commission rate, or sending us promotional materials. Two of the VPNs we actively earn commissions on — PureVPN and BlancVPN — are reviewed on this site with the same scoring methodology as providers we earn nothing from. In the reviews, we note genuine weaknesses alongside genuine strengths.

Affiliate links are marked with a disclosure label near each call-to-action. We follow FTC guidelines on affiliate disclosure.

If you ever disagree with a ranking or find a factual error in a review, use our contact page. We correct mistakes publicly.