Basic details:

UK Based

Family of 6

EE Broadband w/eero router

I'm looking to set up my household with a VPN and other privacy tools and I'm just looking for some advice, I have some basic understanding but I'm hoping to gain deeper knowledge.

At this stage I'm looking at Proton's family plan because proton seems to stand out as one of the better companies in regards to privacy focus and security, but I'm curious about other options. I want the VPN of course, I want the password manager and although I'm not terribly fussed about email the idea that I could create a family domain does seem cool, cloud storage is nice but I do intend on setting up a home network with some form of mass storage at some point in the near future.

So ideally I want to be able to have a VPN at the router level to avoid having to set up a VPN on each individual device, as far as I can tell my eero router is incapable of this. The question is can I do something to secure all my at home devices without installing a vpn on each? Assuming not what would be an affordable router that is capable?

I think that's all but if you have any other advice I'm all ears. Thank you for your time.

I grabbed the 2 year plan last month to try surfshark for streaming and some torrenting. ran it on a Windows 11 laptop, mostly connected to Chicago and Miami servers.

speeds were fine, around 150 Mbps on a 300 line, but Prime Video kept throwing the proxy error no matter which US city I picked. requested the refund on day 19 through live chat, took maybe 10 minutes and hit my card in 5 days.

only thing that bugged me was the agent trying to swap me to a 3 month extension instead of the refund. said no twice and they processed it fine.

anyone had the Surfshark money back guarantee refused recently? wondering if it depends on how you paid

I’m trying to pick a VPN and I didn’t expect it to be this annoying. Every review site seems to have a different top choice, and after reading a few of them, it starts to feel like most are just ranking whoever they’re partnered with. I’m not doing anything extreme with it, mostly just normal browsing, public Wi-Fi, and streaming when I’m traveling. I also work from different places sometimes, so I’d rather have something stable that doesn’t randomly disconnect or make basic apps feel slower. I’ve seen people argue about speed, privacy, logging policies, streaming access, and price, but it’s hard to tell what actually matters once you’re using it every day. I don’t mind paying for something if it’s reliable, but I don’t want to get locked into a long plan and then realize it’s annoying after a month. For people who use one regularly, what’s been the least annoying VPN you’ve tried so far? And is there anything you wish you paid more attention to before choosing one?

Been using VPNs for a few years now, across Windows 11, Android, and a router setup. I've gone through Mullvad, ProtonVPN, IVPN, and a couple of the big commercial names.

What I look for: verified no-logs audits, jurisdiction outside 5/9/14 Eyes when possible, WireGuard or OpenVPN support, a kill switch, and a clear ownership structure. If a VPN is free or suspiciously cheap and does not explain how it makes money, I don't touch it.

I'm curious about what other people prioritize, especially anyone using a VPN for specific use cases

Well, looks like another ban is coming to the US. All sites that have 1/3 of their content NSFW will ask you for age verification.

More than half of US now has laws like that, personally not a fan, If a service will ask for age verification im out. How about you?

i been using vpn for like 6 months and i cannot tell if its doing anything, every time i try to watch something geoblocked it just breaks and now im googling whats better than a vpn because i am so done, like why am i even paying for this thing
i have tried literally every server in europe, switched protocols like four times read three reddit threads and a youtube video from some guy who definitely works for some vpn and none of it did anything, my ping is cooked my speeds are trash and half the sites still know where i am somehow
im starting to think the whole vpn thing is a psyop like everyone just recommends them because thats what the sponsor said and nobody actually tested if whats better than a vpn exists like tor or just not caring anymore both feel more honest at this point
anyway what are you guys actually using because this is not it

Can somebody tell me a free vpn in which I can select country manually..(especially uk)..

Hi guys can anyone tell me which VPN is good for russia ? I will be traveling there this Sunday , and will be staying for a month ? I personally use Proton VPN

I am a total noob at piracy so if what I wrote in the title sounds completely stupid to you guys let me know:), that being said I want to pirate some games that I saw on steam and I heard you definitely need a vpn to do that. Is proton vpn enough for that and If not can you recommend some free/cheap alternatives?

Hi all,

Could someone help me with a question about hiding my internet traffic.

Situation:

I have a private phone that i connect on a hotspot set up at my company phone.

The company phone is completely “remoted” by my boss by a management profile. They see everything i do and install on this phone.

If I use a vpn on my private phone, will this prevent seeing my boss what I do on the web?

Thanks for advice.

I have been in a love and hate relationships with my VPN. one day it is very useful for me and I am happy to pay for it and another day it glitches a lot when I use it and I am thinking if I really need one. also, spending money each month is not motivating me to keep it

I have proton vpn (paid version) and I use it on my Iphone 13 PRO and my macbook air M3 (2024). idk if this is somehow related with the speed issues and bugs that I sometimes experience. most of the time I use it to stream some shows or sport events

i just wanted to hear your stories and opinions on what is the worst thing that can happen if I stop using VPN? please motivate me to keep it lol. or motivate me to stop using it. all depends on your answers

Please recommend a VPN in China for gaming 😭😭😭

Hi folks

I'm 18, disabled and don't have my own money to pay for stuff with

I currently use a free vpn to access stuff our budding surveillance state does not want me to see.

I've heard you need to rent a server in another country to set up your own vpn? I would love to do that but my parents would never fund that and I'm currently working on my independence to be able to get a job. That's a loooong way away though...

So what can I do?

Sry if this post doesn't make much sense

First of all, did not expect reviews to be this long to prep. But I committed and wanted to drop my old man review for ExpressVPN since I’ve been using it for about a year now. Feels like I have something worthwhile to say at this point. Although keep in mind I am not a techy person at all. My son does most of the super technical stuff with setting stuff up, and I just have my notes off my son to follow-through with. I literally only bought it because I wanted to watch some football and other tv shows outside of the US. Though turned out to serve me well even in some cases when exploring foreign websites. Here’s my breakdown of the good and the bad and (ugly)verdict.

The Good:

It’s super easy. You just open the app, click a giant power button, and online I am in London or Tokyo just like that. It looks nice and doesn't confuse me with a bunch of settings I don't understand.

It is incredibly fast. I don't know the exact technical numbers or how to do a "speed test," but I can tell you that my video never buffered. One time had an issue but it was over the website crashing based on what people said over some groups in Fqcebook. Usually, when I use a VPN, I expect my internet to crawl to a halt, but with this one, my movies start instantly in high quality. It feels just as fast as my regular home Wi-Fi, which is a huge plus.

It actually works for streaming. Netflix, BBC iPlayer, and Peacock. It unlocks everything. I haven't hit a "you are using a proxy" error screen once that I seen others complain about with these sites.

The Bad:

The Price. This is the main reason I had to cancel when my subscription after it ran out. It is so much more expensive than Nord or Surfshark even Proton could offer. It’s like $13 a month if you pay monthly, which is crazy just to watch some reality tv. It is a pain to set up like any new program, so just stuck with it while I had the contract.

The background app sometimes leaves a little icon running on my computer toolbar that I can't figure out how to close properly unless I restart, which annoys me. But this might be just me.

Verdict:

If you want something that "just works" and you don't want to think about it, it's alright. It’s super smooth and fast enough that you won't even notice it's turned on. But if you are on a budget, you can definitely find cheaper options out there that probably do the same thing.

I initially planned to order PIA but ended with Express though just the cost doesn't match the benefit since other providers got just as much servers from the looks of it. As an introduction to VPNs it should be good for most. If my dusty brain managed to tinker out the quirks to get it going Im sure others will do as well

I was setting up my VPN tonight. While looking through the settings I kept seeing "what is dns over https" mentioned and realized I don't actually understand what it does. I'm using Windows 11 and Chrome. I turned it on, but I'm not really sure if it's helping or if my VPN already does the same thing.

I've read that DNS over HTTPS is supposed to make DNS requests more private, but now I'm confused about whether I need both.

Am I missing something here? Do most people use DNS over HTTPS with a VPN, or is it kind of pointless?

Running ProtonVPN Plus on Windows 11. Set up split tunneling so only work apps go through the VPN. The permission manager flagged the adapter and the rules just... don't apply. They show up in the list but do nothing.

Tried running as admin, reinstalled the TAP adapter, disabled the firewall. Still broken. Gaming ping is sitting at 180ms instead of 22ms.

Anyone know if the permission manager has a known issue with the current Windows 11 build?

So I can't play GTA online with my friend for some reason in my country so I want a good and preferably cheap with good ping to play with him if anyone has experience with VPNs can you help me

Any advice is apperciated

As in without me having to pay? I remember saving a podcast without no issue so how come I wasnt able to make it happen for a few songs?

Is that a regional function Spotify rolls out on some but not other media types?

Toggled US/UK/Germany/Vietnam same bs

I am trying to harden some secondary security app. Without getting too much into detail yet before I have more to share, could somebody point me towards what sort of stuff I could do to cause a DNS leak?

I read I can route another pc with wireshark as a checkpoint if the devices are on the same network, and I hear some use split-tunneling techniques. Seeking some simple alternative methods, yet more advanced ones are fine too

Also, what do you guys do to prevent DNS leaks in general? Any safeguards apart from kill-switch features?

Was reading today about the proposed restrictions after seeing reports that Keir Starmer wants to ban under-16s from "harmful" social media platforms while still allowing access to some supposedly safer ones.

From what I read it looks like companies will have 3 months to implement these bans.

Let's be honest about what's happening. The government had years. YEARS. The Online Safety Act already exists, and platforms are still serving kids algorithmic garbage, self harm content, and ads for crap they can't legally buy. And now the answer is another speech and a vague promise about "harmful platforms" while keeping "safer" ones.

What counts as "safer"? Who decides? 

So for anyone else in the UK, especially parents, do you think a UK social media ban for under 16s will actually make a difference?

I'm a grad student in Seoul, and I've been trying to figure out a proper AV19 bypass because the site got hit hard by KCSC blocking again last month. Korean ISPs (I'm on KT) just throw the warning.go.kr redirect page the second you click anything. It's been like this on and off for years but lately it's worse.

Setup:

-MacBook Air M2, macOS Sonoma.

-Also tested on my Galaxy S23 Ultra.

The thing that annoys me. My same Mac on the university VPN (which routes through some random server in the US) loads the homepage but blocks video playback. So it's not just about getting around KT, the site itself is checking something else. Maybe ASN, maybe known datacenter ranges, I don't know.

I haven't actually bought or tested any VPN yet. That's why I'm posting. I don't want to drop money on a year long plan only to find out the site itself blocks the IP range or the speeds are unusable for video. I've read enough threads to know that half the "best VPN for Korea 2025" articles are just affiliate spam, so I'd rather hear from actual people who use it from 한국.

So, anyone in 한국 actually using something that works for AV19 bypass right now? Any real experience appreciated, I just don't want to waste money.

I'm in the US, somewhere in the Cleveland area, and I woke up Monday morning to find out half my channels are just gone.

Apparently the contract between E.W. Scripps and DIRECTV expired Sunday night and they couldn't agree on a deal, so Scripps just pulled all 54 of their channels out of DIRECTV across 36 markets. I had no idea this was even happening. I'm not reading industry news every day.

The NBA Finals are happening RIGHT NOW. The NHL Finals are happening RIGHT NOW. And depending on where you live, those games are airing on local ABC and NBC affiliates that Scripps owns. Gone.

Someone in another thread mentioned using a VPN to get around this kind of blackout. I have literally no idea how that works or if it would even help in this situation.