What is VPN.AC?
Established in 2012, VPN.AC is a Romanian-based, private network service that prioritizes on security and anonymity. Operated by Netsec Interactive Solutions, the provider offers cutting-edge features like adjustable encryption strength, high-security DNS lookups, and XOR VPN obfuscation (stealth mode) for exceeding government privacy standards. It also has a free encrypted proxy extension that goes by the name “SecureProxy”, which can be installed on numerous popular web browsers. For more information about the service, read this detailed VPN.AC review:
| Pros | Cons |
| 1. 7-day Money Back Guarantee
2. Accepts Bitcoin Payments 3. Kill Switch and Stealth Mode 4. Romanian-Based VPN 5. Browser Add-on |
1. No Free trial
2. No port forwarding |
VPN.AC Pricing Review
Our VPN.AC review unveils that the service offers quite a simple pricing package. It offers just one plan, divided into four subscription options. This means, no matter what you choose, you receive the same encryption strength, features list, and unlimited bandwidth. The only difference is the subscription length of each plan. The longer the subscription, the lesser you have to pay.
For instance, the monthly package is available for $9 per month, which is quite reasonable considering the features you receive. However, if you opt for the 3-month alternative, you are qualified for 11% discount, which drops the pricing to $8 per month. This means, you only pay $24 in total. The six-month plan reduces the pricing to $6, which means you pay $36 only.
If you want to receive the most value, go for the 1-year subscription plan. This plan gives users a remarkable 56% discount, dropping the monthly pricing to a remarkable $4.8 per month. This means, you only pay a minimum of $58 for using the VPN year-round. Compared to other providers, the pricing offered by VPN.AC is quite reasonable and budget-friendly.
VPN.AC Trial
According to our VPN.AC review, the service does not offer a free trial to its customers. This means, you cannot just signup with the VPN, without buying a subscription plan. Nevertheless, there is a free SecureProxy service available. Install the add-on to enable encryption of your browser traffic, preventing third-party services and governmental agencies from spying on your internet activity.
VPN.AC Lifetime
Our VPN.AC review discovers that the provider does not offer a lifetime subscription for potential customers to enjoy. We tried searching through numerous sites like StackSocial and CouponSock too, but could not find any deal that could give users lifetime access for a reasonable price. Your best bet to leverage a good price is to use discount codes.
VPN.AC Discount Code
The provider itself offers a remarkable discount on three of its subscription plans. However, if the pricing still seems a little too high, always enter a discount code to reduce the costs further. Simply visit the VPN-Service website and click on whatever discount plan seems suitable. You will receive a discount code, which you can use while placing your order.
VPN.AC Accepted Payment Methods
According to our VPN.AC review, the provider accepts all major forms of payment. This includes Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express credit/debit cards, region-based payments like SEPA Direct Debit, WebMoney, iDeal, UnionPay, AliPay, and over a 100 prepaid voucher cards like altcoins and Perfect money. To stay anonymous, users also have the option of paying via Bitcoin or PayPal.
VPN.AC Refund Review
Although the service does not offer a free trial, our VPN.AC review discovers it does provide a 7-days money back guarantee to its customers. If you are not satisfied with the quality of the VPN service, you can receive a full refund 7 days after your account activation. However, the provider emphasizes that you must tell the reasoning of you leaving the service. They believe in fixing the problem you are facing to help improve service. Below is a screenshot from their FAQ section.
VPN.AC Servers Review
Our VPN.AC review unveils that the service has a good list of servers. You have the ability of establishing a secure connection in more than 23 locations. The provider has 81 servers spread across USA, UK, Singapore, Sweden, Romania, Poland, Netherlands, Mexico, Luxembourg, Lithuania, South Korea, Japan, Italy, Hong Kong, France, Finland, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, and Australia.
Best part of all: servers used by VPN.AC connect to 1000 MB/s (gigabit) channels. This ensures you receive remarkable speed and reliability. The service does not add any bandwidth limitations or data restrictions. Encryption is also superb and the provider uses secure commercial encrypted storage devices, compliant for military/governmental use, like NATO InfoSec, FIPS 140-2 Level 3, and Common Criteria EAL).
Another great thing about the service, according to our VPN.AC review is the VPN Nodes Status page. Here users can gain all the information they need regarding which servers are currently online. As you can see below, you can view the hostname and the bandwidth usage on 15 minutes average. This gives you a clearer overview on regarding which servers offer the best speeds.
VPN.AC Secure Proxy Review
If you do not have enough money to purchase the VPN service, you can always leverage browser security and anonymity via the SecureProxy feature. This remarkable software add-on is installable on all popular browsers, which include Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. Although it does not offer complete privacy, the extension encrypts your browser traffic, while masking your IP address.
This enables users to visit geo-restricted websites and stream content by connecting to relevant servers. Best part of all: you receive strong encryption for all browsing activity, as the software uses TLS and advanced Firewalls/DPI. Undoubtedly, this is one of the best “VPN inside browser” add-ons available to customers, who are not looking to spend much money for anonymity on the web. Locations available for connection via SecureProxy extensions.
VPN.AC China Review
Upon observing and connecting to multiple servers in locations all around the world, our VPN.AC review found that the service does not offer connectivity to China. However, this is pretty much a good decision, considering the highly strict data retention and copyright infringement laws of the country. Users have plenty of other safer locations for establishing a secure VPN connection.
VPN.AC Privacy and Logs Review
According to our VPN.AC review, the service tends to put security and anonymity at the top priority. The website boasts a simple design. You have lots of information at your disposal for trusting the service, a rarity with most VPN providers. The FAQ is better than usual and answers all issues/concerns in detail. You further receive good privacy via shared IP addresses on VPN Nodes.
Another great thing about using VPN.AC is that it is a Romanian-based service. This means, you can feel completely assured that your information is in safe hands, as the country places strict focus on user privacy and believes tracking citizen activity is a violation of constitutional rights. The service also does not use any third-party tracking services on their website.
VPN.AC Protocols Review
Our VPN.AC review unveils hat the service supports all popular forms of protocols for connection. You can establish a VPN connection via pure TLS with the browser add-on, PPTP, IPSec (L2TP and IKEv2), and OpenVPN. Best part of all: you get to leverage innovative VPN encryption. The service uses military grade AES-GCM 256-bit encryption with SHA512 HMAC and PFS for handshake and 4096-bit RSA authentication (10x stronger than traditional 2048-bit SSL).
VPN.AC P2P/Torrenting Review
According to our VPN.AC review, the service is quite open to P2P/Torrenting. Except for UK and US servers, users can download/share torrents on all servers. Since the provider has its own private DNS servers, it also prevents local ISPs and governmental agencies from snooping on your torrenting history. We also tested servers for DNS leaks using DNSLeaktest.com, but found no issues whatsoever – even without enabling the Disable NIC DNS feature.
VPN.AC Netflix Review
If you are using the SecureProxy add-on for accessing Netflix, you may encounter certain issues. However, the VPN service offers completely anonymity and masks your IP address to mimic one from the US location. This ensures you can easily access the US Netflix website and content that would not be available in another location. Enjoy streaming HD movies/TV shows!
Is VPN.AC Safe?
Our VPN.AC review unveils that the service is incredibly honest regarding what information it stores and for how long. The provider openly admits to collection email address for those who communicate via ticketing system, access logs to identify fraudulent signups and website hacking attempts, and connection logs for 1 day for troubleshooting certain problems might encounter.
VPN.AC does not shy away from admitting it records both bandwidth usage statistics for customers and servers. However, it also clears out that this information remains in storage for 1 day with access logs deposited for a month. Almost all VPN services record this information, but rarely ever be open to admitting it. Later on, when found storing logs, they end up losing many customers.
However, VPN.AC remains quite straightforward and honest from the very beginning. The service also clearly defines the duration for which this information is stored, something that most popular VPN providers miss. While we would appreciate no logs at all, we must give 10 points to the provider for their honesty. You can read the Privacy Policy here.
Another great thing about using VPN.AC is that their website does not use any third-party tracking services. It is also comes among those few VPN providers, which avoid using Google Analytics, as it defeats the purpose of a privacy service! To validate the claim, we performed a tracker test on two renowned software: Ghostly and Privacy Badger. You can see the results below:
VPN.AC Support Review
Our VPN.AC review unveils that the service has quite the active support system. The provider makes sure to cover all bases of communication, so that no customer is limited from receiving appropriate assistance to problems encountered, while using the service. We contacted the support team for a simple issue and received a reply within 2 hours or less.
Therefore, you can feel relieved to obtain instant support, if you encounter any issue. You have plenty of options to contact the support department. Just visit the support page and choose any option that works best for you. For technical/billing support, you can use the ticketing system. You can even set the priority to low, medium, or high for your concerns.
If you want answers to simple queries, you can sees assistance from the FAQ section, divided into three categories. The general section covers all issues you my encounter regarding account setup and troubleshooting common problems, the security and privacy section assists regarding safety concerns and issues, and compatibility provides you info regarding how to use the VPN on different platforms.
VPN.AC also boasts an active and helpful knowledgebase that will provide you all the information you need regarding basic VPN knowledge, new releases from the provider, and other general topics of discussion. Below is a screenshot of how the blog page looks.
VPN.AC Tutorials Review
We love it when a service goes the extra mile in providing support to customers via Tutorials/setup guides. They can really make life easier for customers who have trouble installing dedicated applications on their platforms. You have setup guides available for a variety of platforms, which include Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and iOS. Users can even follow guides to setup the VPN on routers that support DD-WRT, Tomato, and AsusWRT.
VPN.AC Apps Compatibility
According to our VPN.AC review, the service supports all popular platforms. It offers dedicated applications for Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android. You can even use its browser add-on counterpart on Mozilla, Firefox, and Opera. There are setup guides available for setting up the VPN manually on different devices using varied protocols.
VPN.AC Windows Client Review
The windows client boasts quite the simple and straightforward design and appearance. All the important options are available right in front of you. Simply enter your username and password, choose the location, protocol, and port. Once done, click on the connect button to establish a secure VPN connection. VPN.ac also has an XOR obfuscated ‘stealth’ mode.
This allows it to slip through annoying VPN-blocking firewalls, which ensures you can easily gain access to geo-restricted website and content. There is also an advanced software settings menu, which gives you access to features, such as Auto-Connect, IPv6 leak protection, DNS leak protection and Kill-switch (gateway) functionality.
VPN.AC Chromebook Compatibility
Our VPN.AC review reveals that the service does not yet offer capability to those using Chrome OS. However, you can still use the browser add-on for securing your internet traffic. At the same time, you have manual setup guides available for setting up the VPN manually on Chromebook laptops that are using the Chrome operating system.
VPN.AC Reddit Review
The provider is quite active on Reddit threads with many users getting increasingly intrigued about the security and privacy offered by VPN.AC. If you want to gain a clearer picture about the service, you can take a look this thread. You can find many comments of users praising the service for its fast speed and remarkable quality of service.
Final Verdict
Our VPN.AC review establishes that the service places strict focus on speed, privacy, compatibility, and security. The pricing is also reasonable and you have a browser add-on available too with 33 locations available for connection. You have plenty of protocols and encryption options. This further boosts the likeability of the service. We highly recommend VPN.AC for any user wishing to download torrents, stream/unblock sites, or receive general security online!
The Good
- Based in Romania
- Clear Privacy Policy
- Great Customer Support
- 3 Simultaneous Connections
- Dedicated Windows, Android, iOS, and Mac apps
The Bad
- No port forwarding
- Lacks Chrome OS app
