With demand for visual content on the rise, businesses found they needed a tool for quickly producing design assets with professional results - whether they had access to an experienced designer or not. 

It’s in this space that Canva effortlessly sits, serving up a free, online design app for your browser. 

Hailed by marketing teams as one of the best graphic design software, the the drag-and-drop tool continues to grow its user-base in part because of its streamlined interface (anyone can create a masterpiece here). And partly because it boosted its offerings with everything from the Canva PDF Editor to Canva Video, the company’s basic and free video editing software.

The web-based digital art tool comes packed with an impressive number of features too, whether you need to add text and stickers to your social media photos or totally revamp your printed assets. But will it hit your creative spot?  

• You can sign up for Canva here

Canva: Pricing & plans

Canva may be subscription based, but its lowest tier is free, which is definitely cause for celebration. With it, you get access to their media editor, over 250,000 templates, 5GB of online storage, and what we’re most interested in for the purposes of this review: over a million photos and graphics.

Should you wish to upgrade to ‘Canva Pro’, you’ll get premium templates, and stock media as a bonus, a crucially useful resize tool (which includes resizing your canvas), and 1TB of online storage, among many other features. This would cost you $120 per year.

If you work with colleagues, you can opt for ‘Canva for Teams’. This would give you all the advantages of Pro, but with the addition of collaborative tools, among others. It’s $150 per year for the first five people you add to your account, and your ‘Pro’ subscription will be automatically upgraded the moment the second person joins your team.

Canva does offer you to try out the Pro version free for 30 days, or use the ‘Free’ tier to test most features out.

Canva: Features

Canva is a versatile graphic design tool that runs in your browser and as an app on Android and iOS: it lets you create brochures, flyers, posters, social media graphics, invitations, calendars, videos, presentations, cards, logos, infographics, labels, letterheads, resumes, menus and more. You can start off with a template or a completely blank slate, and build your design up however you want.

The platform includes an impressive number of editing and layout tools as well – covering everything from image cropping to blur effects to background removal. Objects can be easily arranged and layered in a project, and it's straightforward to add extras like text captions or fun stickers on top of whatever you're doing.

Canva prides itself on being simple to use for anyone, with or without graphic design experience, and it's certainly true that the templates and intuitive tools mean you can create something very professional-looking very quickly. However, it's not just a suite of apps for beginners – seasoned design professionals can also get plenty of use out of Canva, as long as they don't want too much detailed control over what's on the page.

We'll explain the pricing plans a little later on, but free and paying users alike get access to thousands of different templates across more than 100 categories to get designs started, while those who are paying a subscription can also get at millions of stock photos, videos and design elements to play around with.

From tweaking your pet photos to putting together a full social media campaign, Canva can turn its hand to almost anything in the world of image editing and graphic design. With no software to install on Windows, macOS or Linux you can just jump straight in and start using it.

Canva: Interface

Canva's ease-of-use is one of its most appealing features, and everything really is well laid out and organized. Just tell Canva what it is you're trying to design, and you'll be met with a wealth of different templates and layout options – one of the strengths of Canva is the number of templates you can work from, which run into the thousands even before you start paying up for a monthly subscription.

Once you have a template or a blank page in front of you, getting elements together is very straightforward. You can change the entire theme of a design – colors, fonts, background images – with a couple of clicks, so it won't take you long to start personalizing the basic template so that it fits with your brand image or whatever you're looking for.

When it comes to layouts, Canva is a little more restrictive than the top-tier professional applications – you can take full control over where everything is in a design, but there's not quite the same level of depth in terms of pixel-by-pixel tweaking. Still, Canva does a great job of keeping everything simple for beginners while also packing in plenty of features to cater for more ambitious designers.

As you move elements around the page, helpful guides appear to enable you to keep everything aligned and looking consistent, while swapping out parts of a design (such as a photograph) can be done with a couple of mouse clicks. Whatever you want to do, whether it's dropping in a new background or embedding a video, Canva makes the process stress-free and intuitive.

The same approach is evident in the mobile apps as well: obviously it's not quite as easy to manage and adapt designs on a smartphone screen, but the Android and iOS apps are as user-friendly as the main web portal. You might be surprised of the quality of work you can get done on your mobile, which again is testament to how well put together and powerful Canva actually is.

Canva: Stock content library

Looking for Canva's free stock photo, video, and graphics library? By default, the sidebar is focused on the project’s Templates, but click on ‘Elements; instead, and scroll down until you see thumbnails for Photos and one row down, Videos. 

This is where Canva’s stock libraries were hiding. As you scroll down, you’ll see other libraries, for Audio, Charts, Frames, and more. Click on ‘See All’ for any of them to replace the sidebar with a larger view of what Canva has to offer for each of these categories.

Take Photos as an example. The sidebar will now show you trending thumbnails in an endless scroll format. Top of the sidebar is a search field, which allows you to find more specific images. 

The concept is as simple as you’d expect it to be: type in some keywords, and Canva will return a bunch of results. Notice that some thumbnails have a little gold crown to their lower right. This indicates those photos are premium ones. All those without the crown can be used for free.

Mouse over a thumbnail to reveal a circle with three dots inside it, top right. Click on that to get more information about the image, like it, add it to a folder, or see other media taken by the same photographer.

Canva : Using stock assets

To use a chosen piece of media, simply click on it, and it’s instantly added to your project. You’ll find handles on the corners and sides of the image, so you can crop and resize it to your liking. You can add as much media as you’d like into your project, and reposition them at will - you’ll notice magnetic guides will help you snap to the centre or edges of the canvas, or any other media already added to your project. All of this applies to photos, graphics, and videos Canva showcases.

You can of course use them with any template for anything Canva caters for, or should you fill your canvas with just the media you chose, you’ll be able to download it straight to your computer, via the ‘Share’ button, top right of the interface.

Select ‘Download’ from that dropdown menu, choose the correct file type you’re after, and download your media.

If that’s all you’re after, there is a much easier way: as we mentioned earlier, there’s a button top right of each thumbnail granting you access to information about it. One such data happens to be where it comes from. It seems most free ones originate from Pexels or Pixabay, while the premium ones can be found in Getty Images. Maybe it would be easier to grab them directly from the source?

As it stands, although Canva offers a stock media library, and you can browse and extract samples for your own use elsewhere, it’s not really ideally suited for use outside of its own templates. Although it can be done, there are easier ways to achieve the same goal, like grabbing them from the original libraries they came from.

Canva: Docs and ChatGPT

In recent months, the company has continued to add new tools and features to the platform. In a move away from pure graphic design, Canva Docs is the latest.

Since the dawn of the word processor, tools like Microsoft Word and Google Docs have had a fundamental problem. It’s nigh-on impossible to design smart-looking documents. A sentence with just one word too many can send everything off-kilter. Text boxes spiral off onto new pages. Images create yawning chasms of negative space no matter how many times you resize them. 

Canva Docs solves this challenge. It effectively bridges the gap between word processor and page layout designer - a sort of simplified DTP software. And it works in a similar fashion to the excellent Canva PDF Editor (and, to be fair, the platform as a whole, with its intuitive design consistency). Notably, you can take these pages and transform them into a PowerPoint-style document using the Docs to Deck function. 

Docs also features a really useful Magic Write tool. Drawing on the power of chatGPT AI, you can quickly get writing prompts and text by clicking the plus and typing what you want from the bot. In our tests, this worked really well to produce content fast - although it’s always best to give these things a good proofread.  

Canva: Final verdict

When you weigh Canva up against something like Adobe Creative Cloud, there's nowhere near the level of complexity or number of features, but then not everyone is looking for what Adobe CC has to offer – some people will prefer a simpler, more intuitive option that takes seconds to learn and get into, and that's exactly what Canva is. In fact, it's arguably a cleaner, more intuitive than its closest competitor, Adobe Express.

While advanced users are going to want more in terms of functionality and flexibility, there's no arguing with the quality of the results that Canva can come up with – the app is capable of producing some really professional-looking designs, with less effort on your part than you might think.

• Best drawing apps and digital art software: Top programs for artists and illustrators

Every VPN provider on the market makes outlandish claims about protecting your privacy and not keeping any logs of your online activity. However, many fail to live up to these claims – often because they are based in a country with less respect for individual privacy, or because they keep logs of your data to share with third parties.

Swedish company Netbouncer AB makes many of the claims we’ve come to expect from the best VPN providers, citing robust protocols that are meant to keep your online activities secure. But can its Azire VPN really live up to the hype?  

Azire VPN: Pricing & plans 

To begin with, AzireVPN doesn’t have a free trial, which is disappointing. However, it does offer 4 different subscription plans (1, 3, 12, or 24-month), with the opportunity to get discounted prices if you opt for a longer plan. It also offers a seven-day money-back guarantee - although one-month subscriptions, Swish payments, cash payments, and cryptocurrency transactions are not eligible for a refund. 

Prices for the different plans are: 

1-month plan: $5.00

3-month option: $12.00 ($4.00 per month)

12-month plan: $45 ($3.75 per month)

24-month plan: $78.00 ($3.25 per month)

Payment options include credit card payments, PayPal, Swish, cryptocurrency, and even cash, which can be mailed to AzireVPN’s Stockholm office.

If you’re looking for a cheaper option, take a look at our guide to find the best free VPN. 

Azire VPN: Privacy & encryption 

The company uses WireGuard, OpenVPN, and the SOCKS5 protocol, along with 256-bit AES encryption, the most secure encryption available. Both OpenVPN and WireGuard are quick and secure, with WireGuard being the fastest option and the industry standard. Although the SOCKS5 proxy protocol is a proxy tunnel without encryption, it is quick and frequently used for navigating around geo-restrictions.

AzireVPN asserts that it adheres to a strict no-logs policy and does not record private information such as your IP address, the websites you visit, or the files you download. They claim to only log your email address and payment information.

Since the host nation of the VPN is a member of the 5/9/14 Eyes, an association of nations that use digital surveillance to monitor their citizens in order to promote cybersecurity, the VPN is quite transparent about its privacy policies. Keep in mind that, unlike other VPN policies, Aspire VPN has not had an independent VPN audit. This means it’s not possible to verify their claims.

To reassure customers that no search queries or seizures have occurred at the company's location, Azire VPN regularly publishes a warrant canary. They even go as far as publishing the complete company address and even extend an invitation to stop by for coffee in their headquarters to demonstrate how seriously committed they are to transparency.

To support their no-log policy claims, the VPN also provides a function known as "blind operator mode," an open-source rootkit that stops your data from leaving protocols, disables the display of endpoints, and permits IP fields from WireGuard. However, it also lacks useful features such as a VPN kill switch, which would monitor the VPN server connection and disconnect the device automatically if the connection is lost. This means you do run the risk of having your IP address revealed.

One excellent feature that does gives Azire VPN a slight edge over other VPNs in terms of security and privacy is that they do not depend on virtual servers or server farms.

Finally, all of Azire VPN's servers support P2P file sharing, but none are specifically tailored for torrenting. Remember that it is unlawful to download copyrighted files, and we don’t support using VPNs for unlawful behavior.

Azire VPN: Streaming 

We put the Azire VPN to the test and discovered that it could unblock a few well-known streaming services. With some of the servers and the WireGuard protocol, we were able to unblock Netflix, Disney+, and Amazon Prime, but that was the extent of its effectiveness. Regardless of how many servers we tried, we were unable to unblock Hulu, we also couldn't unblock HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video, or BBC iPlayer. This means that those specifically looking for a Netflix VPN or general streaming VPN may prefer to try a different tool.  

Azire VPN: Speed & experience 

When using a VPN for torrenting or streaming, you want the speed to be similar to your regular internet speed as this will determine how quickly content uploads. 

We put Azire VPN to the speed test, firstly trying a server in Spain. The connection was 70Mbps, and it gave us a download speed of 9.68Mbps – expected speeds considering that the server was far away from our physical location. Similarly, a Dutch server gave us a download speed of 4.52Mbps. Overall, we observed that the speed on local servers was good while the speed on distant servers was lower. 

Azire VPN: Customer support 

The website states that email is the only way to contact the support team and that you can only expect a response from them between the hours of 8:00 am and 9:00 pm universal time. On the website's support section, there are clear installation instructions, however, you won't find popular features such as live chat or phone support. 

Azire VPN: Apps 

AzireVPN has apps for Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, and Android. The software can be downloaded from the website or Google Play, and installation is a quick process.

Although the desktop applications are fairly simple and easy to use, they lack important features like a kill switch that other top VPNs have. The mobile VPN apps are similar to their desktop counterparts, but some of the features have been stripped out. 

Azire VPN: Alternatives 

Proton VPN

Proton VPN is one of the best VPN services currently available. It's a fantastic option for streaming because even the free version can access geo-restricted streaming services. It is also a great choice for torrenting and has excellent security features to give you the privacy you deserve.

Read our full Proton VPN review

Hide.me

Hide.me is one of the leading VPNs on the market. It offers great speed, can unblock virtually anything, and has a variety of unique and cutting-edge features for its customers.

Read our full Hide.me review

Nord VPN

If you're trying to find a VPN service that provides privacy, security, and speed, pick NordVPN. It provides military-grade online security and permits unrestricted access to your preferred websites (Netflix and all the major streaming platforms). It also does not keep any records of your activities and permits six simultaneous device connections due to its strict no-log policy.

Read our full NordVPN review

ExpressVPN

You must be familiar with this VPN if you haven't been living under a rock. It is based in China – a  privacy-friendly jurisdiction – has 3000 servers, is safe, doesn't log anything, unblocks streaming websites, allows connections from five devices at once, and has blazing-fast speed. It will also keep your data safe and secure.

Read our full ExpressVPN review 

Verdict

AzireVPN is a very transparent platform with many good features. It is suitable for torrenting and unblocking some streaming services. However, it doesn’t work in China, lacks a kill switch option, and hasn't requested an independent auditor to examine its servers. Choosing a VPN is dependent on your specific requirements, so if this VPN meets your requirements, go for it. 

It’s all about ‘dude’. The dude. Visit the Anonymous VPN homepage, and it’s the ‘anonymous mascot’ in the dark shades that dominates all. We’re told he will never reveal his name. And, we assume, the company will never reveal our name either. Or, we’d hope, any other details, if it’s set to join the ranks of the best VPN services.

The company is based in Gibraltar, a territory of Great Britain and member of the 5/9/14 Eyes Alliance - a group of countries that share security data. As of this review, Anonymous VPN hasn’t published a full VPN server count but they said they have "several servers" in 23 countries such as Singapore, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Switzerland, Sweden, Netherlands, Australia, Spain, Itay, Ireland, New Zealand, Romania, South Africa, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Canada, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Ukraine, and Russian. 

In comparison to industry giants, which have thousands of servers and cover multiple locations, this is a limited server count. 

Anonymous VPN: Pricing & plans 

In our years of reviewing VPNs, we haven’t come across a VPN provider that charges for a free trial, it is called a free trial for a reason. However, Anonymous VPN has a non-refundable 3-day plan at $1, and if you fail to cancel your 3-day trial, they will automatically upgrade you to a weekly plan at $4/week without consulting you, which is highly unethical.

The VPN plans are as followed:

Monthly: $12.00

Annually: $69 ($5.75/month)

The plans allow only three simultaneous connections, unlimited bandwidth, and a dynamic IP address. We dislike that Anonymous VPN only accepts credit or debit cards for payment. However, payments on the platform are handled by SwiftCharge, so no payment information is stored. Keep in mind that there is a 14-day money-back guarantee included with the monthly and yearly plans. You only get a refund if you used no more than 500 megabytes and made fewer than 100 connections. All in all, it's hardly a cheap VPN. 

Anonymous VPN: Privacy & encryption 

Anonymous VPN claims to follow a strict "zero-log" policy to ensure maximum privacy by not tracking or keeping records of the websites you visit or your actions while linked to the VPN. 

The policy does state that in order for you to make payments, they collect your email address and credit card information. They do, however, collect bandwidth data and timestamps, which are used to assess network performance. Although they claim not to log data, we would like to see them have an independent auditor run a full VPN audit to be sure. 

Anonymous VPN may be based in Gibraltar, but because it doesn’t collect and store personal data that can be used to track you, there’s nothing to turn over even if a government requests user data.

Anonymous VPN is also a P2P-friendly provider - in other words, you can use this VPN for torrenting. Remember, though, downloading copyrighted files is illegal, and we recommend that you check your country's laws before torrenting. 

Anonymous VPN: Streaming 

One of the reasons you need a VPN, aside from not having to worry about your privacy being compromised, is to stream geo-restricted content. We tested the streaming VPN, expecting great things. We were sorely disappointed. It's a shame - it’s a fine VPN for Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and BBC iPlayer, but it doesn't appear to work for other streaming services. 

Anonymous VPN: Speed & experience 

The rate at which your internet connection can retrieve data from the internet is referred to as download speed. It is expressed in megabits per second (Mbps). Upload speed is the rate at which data can be sent from your devices to the internet via your internet connection and it is expressed in megabits per second (Mbps). 

We ran the speed tests on a server near our location in Canada and saw a fast speed, with websites loading in 3 seconds, which is quite acceptable. On a 30Mbps connection, we tested a Singapore server and received a download speed of 11.41Mbps; on a Russian server, we received a download speed of 15.23Mbps. We noticed that a nearby server had a fast speed, while a distant server had a slow but manageable speed. 

Anonymous VPN: Customer support

Anonymous VPN can be contacted via email through a ticketing system which is available 24/7, the responses are provided in English within 20 minutes of the inquiry.

The VPN platform also has a comprehensive Knowledgebase section that covers most topics, with a two-part FAQ section and helpful tips on some of the most common problems subscribers might encounter. To engage their community, they also have a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Anonymous VPN, on the other hand, lacks a live chat feature, which has become popular among so many VPN providers these days.

Anonymous VPN: Apps 

Anonymous VPN is compatible with Windows,, with mobile VPN apps for iOS and Android. Unfortunately, there’s no support for macOS and Linux. Installing and configuring the Anonymous VPN app is simple, requiring no technical knowledge. To begin, you must register on the website, where you will be asked for your email address and asked to create a password. 

Anonymous VPN: Alternatives 

Top alternatives to try include ExpressVPN, NordVPN, Proton VPN, and VyprVPN. These offer better security assurances and value for money. 

ExpressVPN allows for five simultaneous connections on devices as well as unblocks all popular streaming media. NordVPN operates over 5,200 servers in 60 nations. Proton VPN does not track your activities and does not collect or use any of your personal information. And VyprVPN's apps are feature-rich and simple to use, and its proprietary Chameleon protocol does more than most to get you online in China and other VPN-unfriendly countries.  

Verdict 

Overall, Anonymous VPN could use some development. Some streaming websites are unblocked, and it has top-notch security features. But the virtual private network simply can’t compete with the fastest VPNs on the market - especially when connecting to a distant server. Additionally, it is quite expensive, lacks a live chat feature, and has a very small server network. 

• Best business VPNs: Get your employees connected safely online

It is crucial to have a fast, reliable, and stable connection wherever you go in today's fast-paced online world where we rely on the internet for everything. It’s especially difficult to keep your data safe from snoopers (government surveillance and would-be hackers) that might want to monitor your online activities. 

The best VPN services are designed to protect your data, many companies have popped up to offer you the opportunity to use their services and protect your data. But is Liquid VPM one of them?

Networking engineer Dave Cox launched LiquidVPN in 2013. The VPN is based in the US which warrants concern because this makes it possible for the US authorities to obtain user information from the company with a warrant if they so choose. 

The VPN has 2,100 public IP addresses and 45 dedicated bare metal VPN servers spread across 11 different nations. LiquidVPN provides servers in the US, Canada, UK, Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Romania, and Singapore. 

But it’s not a VPN for China. This is because China's internet blockades cannot be circumvented by LiquidVPN because it lacks obfuscation protocols. So, not a VPN for China, but most of the world should be covered.  

Pricing & plans 

LiquidVPN has three pricing plans: SideKick, Road Warrior, and Ultimate or Family Plan, which are all available in monthly and annual subscription plans. LiquidVPN doesn’t offer any free trials, and there’s no free VPN option.

The plans are as follows:

SideKick

1-month plan: $7.00

12-month plan: $57.00 ($4.75 per month)

2 simultaneous connections

Road Warrior

1-month plan: $10.00

12-month plan: $69.00 ($5.75 per month)          

4 simultaneous connections

Ultimate

1-month plan: $18.00

12-month plan: $105.96 ($8.83 per month)

8 simultaneous connections

Payment options include Bitcoin, PayPal, Master Card, and even cash, although using cash or bitcoin for payment makes you ineligible for their 7-day money-back guarantee should you want a refund.

Privacy & encryption 

OpenVPN, SSTP, and L2TP/IPSec are the three VPN protocols that LiquidVPN supports. It also employs ES-256-CBC, AES-128-CBC, AES-256-GCM, and Camellia-256-CBC encryption. These protocols provide excellent security for your data being transmitted through the VPN tunnel and are practically impossible for any hacker to breach.

The VPN also provides public and shared IP modulation, as well as a built-in VPN kill switch called "Liquid Lock" in its app. The public one is your personal IP address, which the VPN randomly chooses for you for each connection you make. Unlike the public IP, a shared IP address is protected by a NAT firewall and is used by numerous VPN users. Your online privacy is greatly increased because your IP changes so frequently and randomly that it is nearly impossible for any hacker or agency to track your online footprints.

When it comes to its log-in procedures, LiquidVPN is open and honest, claiming that it doesn't watch the information you send or receive. It does record additional information, such as the total number of active user logins per account, the status of the account at the moment, the number of active sessions, and failed logins, but it does not store any identifiable data about you.

Overall, that is a pretty good logging policy because LiquidVPN only keeps the absolute minimum amount of information about your VPN session, which makes it impossible for anyone to determine your activities or identity. Even though they say they don't keep records of customers' activities, we'd like to see them go the extra mile and hire a third party to conduct a VPN audit of their websites for logs, just like other VPNs. Only then can we fully put our trust in them. 

Streaming

According to LiquidVPN, it is effective at unblocking geographically restricted streaming services in the US. When we tested the VPN, it unblocked streaming services like Netflix, BBC iPlayer, and HBO. 

So, if you’re looking for the best streaming VPN or, specifically, a Netflix VPN, this tool should provide ample opportunity to watch region-locked content.  

Speed & experience 

LiquidVPN is headquartered in Wyoming, USA. The company has at its users’ disposal over 2,100 public IP addresses and 45 dedicated bare-metal VPN servers in 11 countries.

Customer support 

With LiquidVPN, you have access to a knowledge base forum with articles on getting started, a FAQ section, a ticket system with quick responses, and an email address. Good options, then, for getting started, or if you run into difficulties.  

Apps 

LiquidVPN runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux, with mobile VPN apps for iOS and Android. The LiquidVPN desktop application has a straightforward-looking interface that is simple to use. From the home screen, you can select your preferred servers and toggle the Liquid Kill Switch feature on or off. 

The interface of the LiquidVPN Android app is identical to that of the desktop apps, it does not, however, have the Liquid Lock kill switch, which is present in the desktop apps and it only supports the OpenVPN protocol.

LiquidVPN alternatives 

Private Internet Access

Although the speeds aren't the best, Private Internet Access excels in all other areas. PIA unblocks Netflix and nearly every other service we tried. It runs on almost any device, is simple to use, has a ton of features, has an audited no-log policy, and costs less than a quarter of what some of the top competitors charge.

Read our full Private Internet Access VPN review

NordVPN 

This VPN has numerous convenience, privacy, and security features such as an Ad blocker, DNS leak protection, robust encryption, and a VPN kill switch all provide security and user-friendly apps.

Read our full NordVPN review

ExpressVPN

ExpressVPN is based in a nation that values privacy, it is quick and secure, unblocks well-known streaming services, supports torrents, doesn't keep any records of your data, is simple to use, has a three-month free trial, and can handle five connections at once. This is one of the leading VPNs on the market.

Read our full ExpressVPN review

CyberGhost

CyberGhost is one of the best VPNs available today. The software never slows down your computer, is simple to use, It offers extensive P2P and torrent functionality, as well as access to over 1200 servers spread across more than 50 countries.

Read our full CyberGhost VPN review 

Verdict

LiquidVPN is quite fast, and has good security features (particularly IP modulation). And it does have the capabilities to unblock content on Netflix and some other geo-restricted streaming platforms. It is, however, a little more costly than other VPN vendors with comparable features. It also has a relatively small server network, no live chat support, and is based in a privacy-invading jurisdiction. 

• Best cheap VPNs: Stay secure on any budget

The best VPN services allow you to browse the web anonymously and unblock restricted sites in any region. Unblock-Us - which is now part of StrongVPN - is not your typical VPN service. It provides you with a new dedicated IP address by directing your DNS queries to its servers and changing your location based on the sites you browse.

This means that Unblock-Us effectively masks your location whenever you use sites that offer location-based services, allowing you to unblock their countries. This makes it different to how other VPN services operate. 

Unblock-Us: Pricing & plans 

Unblock-Us offers a one-week free trial that doesn’t require a credit card, giving you the opportunity to test the software. But there’s no free VPN offer here. Instead, the service has two subscription plans:

Monthly: $5.83

Yearly: $49.90 ($4.16/month)

Each plan only allows you to be connected to one device at a time. This does not meet industry standards, which would typically be 5 – 7 simultaneous connections. 

Unblock-Us is also below industry standards in terms of payment methods, as they currently only offer Visa and MasterCard. Sadly, there aren’t methods like PayPal or Bitcoin for maintaining anonymity. However, they do provide full refunds to users who cancel their annual subscription within the first thirty days of purchase.

Unblock-Us: Privacy & encryption 

Unblock-Us makes use of its SmartVPN to add an additional layer of security to your connection, as opposed to SmartDNS which uses a proxy to hide the origin of your IP address from the domains that ask for it. 

Rather than using encryption software, the company simply retains the entire content of your data for transfer so that the data within cannot be modified.

In its Privacy Policy, the company notes that it does not monitor or log any traffic or consumption of its services, nor does it store any of your data that passes through its servers. They also claim never to manipulate the content you access or provide information about your usage to others – unless they are legally forced to. In other words, it appears that some data is being gathered, and if a government agency requests any information about you, they would have comply.

Unfortunately, Unblock-Us has not contracted a third party to run a VPN audit and independently confirm its claims of zero logging. This means we have to take the service at its word that sensitive information about your online activities is not being jeopardized, which can be risky. However it’s important to reiterate that Unblock-Us claims that it doesn't collect any traffic data.  

Unblock-Us: Streaming 

Unblock-Us is a great option if you are looking for a top streaming VPN or dedicated Netflix VPN. That’s because customers can access streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, BBC iPlayer, Amazon Prime Video, and others that might be blocked in some locations due to geo-restrictions.  

Unblock-Us: Speed & experience 

Unblock-Us is owned by the company NetProtect Ltd, headquartered in Nicosia, Cyprus. It operates with the help of 100 servers in 17 countries.

Unblock-Us: Customer support 

Although Unblock-Us does not offer live chat, the webpage does have a support section with helpful articles on a variety of subjects and customer support via web ticket or phone. 

Unblock-Us: Apps 

Unblock-Us asserts that it can be set up on all popular desktops, with mobile VPN apps available. It also claims to work with a variety of other gadgets, such as Apple TV, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Wii and Amazon Fire TV.  

Unblock-Us: Alternatives 

Unblock-Us has been absorbed by StrongVPN as of the writing of this review – which is a great option for those specifically looking for a streaming or Netflix VPN. Read our StrongVPN review to find out more and see if it makes a good replacement, or checkout some other alternatives below. 

NordVPN

It ranks among the best VPNs, and has been operational for more than ten years. You have unrestricted access to your preferred websites and can take advantage of online security that meets military standards. Furthermore, it doesn't keep a record of your data, comes with a 30-day refund policy, and supports multiple client device connections.

Read our full NordVPN review

Windscribe

Windscribe has special software that blocks trackers from following you, a focus mode that makes it easier for you to concentrate when you need it, and a strict no-login rule that keeps your online activities strictly confidential. Additionally, the service provider has a protocol for getting around Internet censorship.

Read our full Windscribe review

Surfshark 

This provider unblocks all streaming content, has a user-friendly app and a generous unlimited devices policy, is lightning fast, and is stuffed with cutting-edge features that are easy to use. Additionally, it has allowed an independent audit to verify its software, unlike the large percentage of VPN providers being used today.

Read our full Surf Shark review

ExpressVPN 

ExpressVPN is based in a country that prioritizes privacy, provides swift and ensures security, unblocks highly regarded streaming services, supports torrents, doesn't hold any documentation of your data, has large numbers of servers distributed out across the world, and is simple to use. It also has a 3-month free trial and allows for five concurrent connections.

Read our full ExpressVPN review

CyberGhost 

CyberGhost provides a number of practical VPN features and a simple interface. It offers extensive P2P and torrent functionality and gives you access to over 1200 servers spread across more than 50 nations. Remote access, DNS leak protection, anonymous browsing, and more are among the features of the software.

Read our full CyberGhost review

TunnelBear

TunnelBear is a must-see for less discerning or casual users. The service has undergone the most exhaustive independent audits available, has a fun theme, strong security features, and unblocks the majority of streaming services, it also does a good job of simplifying VPNs for novice users.

Read our full TunnelBear review 

Verdict

Unblock-Us might have been a suitable VPN substitute, but since it is currently inactive, it is impossible for us to say. Instead we recommend reading our review of Strong VPN to find out if the VPN it was absorbed by offers better performance, or checking our top alternatives.