I made a spreadsheet comparing different open source VPN providers.
Part 2 here
Providers
Notes
- Please do not start a flame war about Proton.
- Please do not start a flame war about cryptocurrencies. Monero is the only cryptocurrency listed because of its privacy.
- The very left column is the category for each row, the middle section is the various VPN providers, and the right section is which VPNs are the best in each category.
- IVPN has two differing plans, which is why “Standard” and “Pro” are sometimes differentiated.
- For accounts, “Generated” means a random identifier is created for you to act as your account, “Required” means you must sign up yourself. Proton VPN allows guest use under specific conditions (e.g. installed from the Google Play Store), but otherwise requires an account.
- Switzerland is seen as more private than Sweden. Gibraltar is seen as privacy neutral.
- All prices are in United States Dollars. Tax is not included.
- Pricing is based on the price combination to achieve the exact time frame. For example, Proton VPN does not have a 3 year plan but you can achieve 3 years by combining a 2 year plan with a 1 year plan.
- The availability section is security based. Availability is framed around a GrapheneOS and secureblue setup.
- The Proton VPN Flatpak is unofficial, but based on the official code.
- Availability on secureblue is based on the
ujust install-vpncommand. Security features must be disabled on secureblue in order to use the GUI for IVPN and Mullvad VPN, but not for Proton VPN. Mozilla VPN and NymVPN are available as Flatpaks, which are safer than layering packages. - I wanted to include more categories, such as which programming languages they are written in, connection speed, and security, but that became far too difficult and complex, so I decided to omit those categories.
Takeaways
- NymVPN is very very new, but it’s off to a strong start. It wins in almost every category. I actually hadn’t heard of it until I started this project.
- If you want a free VPN, Proton VPN is the only one here that meets that requirement.
- If you want to pay week-by-week, IVPN is the only one that allows that.
- If you’re paying month-by-month on a budget, Mullvad VPN is the cheapest option.
- NymVPN is the cheapest plan for anything past 1 month.
- If you want to use Accrescent as your main app store, IVPN is the only VPN available there for now.
- If you want to pay for a bundle of apps, including a VPN, Proton sells more than just a VPN.
- Mozilla VPN is terrible. The only thing it has going for it is a verified Flatpak, but NymVPN also has that so it doesn’t even matter.
Why is being on the Google Play store a feature worth highlighting? To use an F-Droid expression, that would be an anti-feature.
With the upcoming restrictions on third-party apps that Google has announced maybe? It’ll be easier to get from Play, and may not be available otherwise at all.
I don’t think giving into Google seizing more power is the way. People doing that is what enables the corporation to continue and have more control over their lives, including their privacy.
As I mentioned, the availability section is security focused. F-Droid has potential security issues compared to Accrescent or the Google Play Store.
I didn’t suggest F-Droid for inclusion though. I merely used its applicable terminology. Still, with Google Play, you trust Google to ensure that the apk is from the actual source, and with F-Droid, that’s delegated to F-Droid. I don’t see that as being less secure.
My bad, I understand now.
Because it’s security focused, it includes app stores that are good for their security (regardless of privacy). Other app stores, such as F-Droid, have security issues that Accrescent and the Google Play Store don’t share. This topic has been argued to death countless times before, and I don’t want to start a flame war, but do try researching it and see what comes up.
While F-Droid has security issues, the ideological security benefit it provides that Accrescent/Play Store/Obtainium doesn’t is the guarantee that the app is open source, and if the developer goes rogue (I.e. Simple Mobile Tools) it gets removed. A lot could be improved though.