What are /r/Express_VPN's favorite Products & Services?

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

By 'most people', do you mean the handful who speak out on Reddit?

Yes, I think we should be concerned. At best, Kape are just chancers jumping on the privacy bandwagon to milk the trend dry. At worst, they're a malicious player going after people's private data. I don't know what the middle would be, perhaps simply pleasing the shareholders. I don't see the users' privacy, or the privacy principles, high on the priority list in any of these scenarios, so I moved to another VPN provider today as soon as I heard the news, despite having 8-9 months of ExpressVPN subscription left.

Using a VPN will both secure your data, as all of your data traffic is sent through en encrypted virtual tunnel, and it also disguises your IP (this is where its useful for torrents).

You can also use a VPN to access geo-blocked content, so, say you know that there is something available on the USA version of netflix , but not the canadian version. You should be able to connect to a US vpn server and then be able to watch that content (assuming you have a netflix subscription already).

The reviews you read are right. ExpressVPN is one of the best out there. Nord is good too.

All decent vpn providers cost an arm and a leg. I can vouch for ExpressVPN based on my personal experience with them for the last 3.5 years. 99$ a year with them is more useful to me than 99$ with, say, Amazon Prime, but that’s because I’m outside the US. I have not tried NordVPN, although they’re highly rated and give ridiculously good d2 year and 3 year deals around Thanksgiving and Black Friday and whatever. About the 5 device limit though, if u get one of the ExpressVPN firmware-supported routers, u easily get around that limited device number. Their support (chat especially) is excellent, they provide access to new streaming services in minimum time (like Disney+ and HBOMax when they first came out) and they release new firmware for the supported routers regularly. Also, changing locations and countries (and even cities) is varied and useful.

This is the disturbing part-

ExpressVPN announced it had been sold as part of a $936 million deal to former adware distributors Kape Technologies, a company co-founded by an ex-Israeli surveillance agent and a billionaire previously convicted of insider trading. 

I just did a support chat with ExpressVPN. They said:

> Thanks for waiting. I checked with the team and it looks like we have an ongoing issue on Amazon Prime US. Amazon Prime is known to block VPN providers from time to time. Since the issue was only recently detected, we don't have an ETA at this time. The good thing is that our engineers are already working on this so I'm positive it will be fixed, soon.

I have no way of knowing when it will be fixed, we just have to keep trying.

Nord does have RAM servers.

"NordVPN changed its server infrastructure to be RAM-only in 2020. Besides that, it started transitioning to a co-located network. That means it ships its own hardware to data centers. That way, only this VPN provider’s staff has access to the servers, so nobody can physically tamper with them."

Oh what a shame - this means Kape owns:

CyberGhost

PIA

ExpressVPN

_financials

Mullvad. I'm clocking 200+ down. Just shy of my connection without a VPN. WireGuard is the jammy jam.

FWIW I also have paid ProtonVPN and it's been slow as mud the entire time regardless of the server I use.

When this happens, it's usually because the service provider, Disney in this case, found and blacklisted the IP address that you were using.

The solution is to try a different server and keep trying different ones until find a working IP. You can also chat with ExpressVPN support and they'll give you a working server.

This is crazy!
By any chance, aren't you residing in any of the countries targeted By the U.S. sanctions?
I know it sounds ridicules but apparently, ExpressVPN has quietly updated their terms of services. In section 6 it reads that:
"You should not access ExpressVPN services if you are located in any of the countries where using, accessing, or subscribing to the Site, Apps, Software, or Services would violate our Export Control Policy."
And then in their Export Control Policy section:

"It is the policy of ExpressVPN to fully comply with all export control and sanctions regimes that apply to its operations. We will not undertake any business that would violate those regimes."

Apparently, this company is now in the hands of bunch of morons! People in countries like Cuba and Iran rely on such services to access Internet. Without VPNs, almost every well-known useful site is blocked.

A VPN service provider, claiming to be located in the British Virgin Islands, following US laws, without actually paying attention to the aforementioned law just proves how unreliable these VPN providers are. Why? because the US gov has already released an INTERPRETIVE GUIDANCE AND STATEMENT OF LICENSING POLICY ON INTERNET FREEDOM regarding countries such as Iran which makes ExpressVPN's new policy completely baseless.

I'm sorry for what happened to you OP. However, I find it weird cause I've been using ExpressVPN for years now mainly for streaming Netflix, and it never cease to amaze me. It's still working perfectly.

Edit: Where are you located if I may ask? There are times that location and the ISP itself matters

No it’s not spying on you. Here’s what’s happening:

-The app tries to call home to an ExpressVPN API to discover the set of available VPN infrastructure.

-Your firewall is rejecting those requests, and as a result the app fails to call home via its standard method. This is quite similar to what happens when customers use the apps in countries with censorship. ISPs there also block the app’s attempts to call home, thus trying to prevent customers from using ExpressVPN.

-The app has features to let it handle such situations.

-You can see those features in action as the app is trying other domains, testing just how much your firewall is blocking.

We’ve previously published some more info in our troubleshooting section under “Why do ExpressVPN apps occasionally contact domains I don’t recognize?”

In general, this relates to censorship-avoidance. A user on a network without censorship (or a firewall acting as such) shouldn’t see these features in action. In your case here, the app is behaving as expected given the trouble the firewall is subjecting it to, and it’s definitely not spying on you. We put a lot of effort into making sure we’re consistently following our privacy policy.

Maybe this is nothing but it was enough to prompt me to switch to a different VPN provider.

As an internet privacy nut I started blocking unwanted traffic at the router level and part of that was blocking certain Amazon servers and only allowing Amazon servers needed to access their movies and shopping. After implementing these firewall rules to accomplish this I found I could no longer access the ExpressVPN website. After some digging I found ExpressVPN's website is hosted on Amazon servers located in the US and is why my router was blocking them.

So basically this means their website falls under US jurisdiction and data collection laws. This is the website you enter your personal details on for your account and interact with to admin your account. It is also the website you use to test your VPN DNS on and is tied to your VPN IP.

I contacted them and asked them about their website being hosted on Amazon and how that ties into their data collection policy. They would not confirm or deny their website is hosted on US Amazon servers and straight up didn't reply or even touch on the data collection part of my question. They would only say "your account is safe". This shady answer among other things prompted me to switch to a different provider.

So maybe they don't log your actual VPN traffic (big maybe) but odds are good they log traffic on there actual website and VPN app that you interact with and of which is tied to your VPN IP address.

Mullvad or ProtonVPN. I personally found paid ProtonVPN to be slow. Mullvad is like greased lightning.

Be aware that if you want/need a VPN to get around geofencing then just stay with ExpressVPN. That's not a primary focus of Mullvad/Proton so it may not help for that. (not why I use a VPN is why I say YMMV)

I think their smart DNS was awful. Thumbnails didn’t load in streaming apps and videos took a long time before playing. Can only register one IP, so I can’t use it at home and at the cabin. Could buy multiple memberships for same price as ExpressVPN, so I guess it’s not that bad, but I find this very annoying.

Hahaha, serious? Proton just went ahead and screwed one of their customers by handing over their details to the authorities, like literally this month.?

And Mullvad is great for privacy, but it does nothing when it comes to unblocking content.

Don’t mind people of the cancel culture. If ProtonVPN does your job keep using it.

About the issue people are mentioning, it applies to protonmail only since Swiss law demands it to be logged. Vpn isn’t legally bound to the law. But potatoes gonna potate and cry on Reddit anyway.

I use several depending on use case. I have a lifetime AdGuard account so I use their VPN on mobile so that I can couple it with their excellent ad blocking tech (it just surpasses anything else, drop dead easy to use, even blocks within apps, etc.). I have ProtonVPN but find it slow. I use several corp VPNs depending on where I'm needing to connect. (PIA, ExpressVPN were good but they are gobbled up by the same people so they're out. I know some who like Nord but I've never used it myself.)

For personal use I tend to favor Mullvad due to jurisdiction, it's supported WireGuard for a while now (also support OpenVPN), have modified their servers to throw out any connection info held in memory if handshake is lost for like 600ms (I think that's what it is), allows multi-hop connections, no contact information is required (you can even pay them in cash if you want), etc.

>Kape Technologies, the company was called Crossrider. It started buying up VPNs.
>
>Crossrider

I have a paid ProtonVPN account too... it's been slow as a snail for a while now. Basically, not useable IMHO.

I've just contacted support again and they are still fixing the connectivity issues on iOS devices. I hope they can get rid of these blocks after a few more days. This always happens, but I think ExpressVPN is very enthusiastic for the resolution. And once they've resolved it, it really is satisfying thinking that they've won the battle between them and the annoying Great Firewall of China. 🤣 Jk! For now, am using my Android device and PC for my VPN needs. 🙏

Same issue. I don’t want ExpressVPN anymore- their customer service is awful. Hulu has been down for months, all they say is, “it’s a know issue”. I’m paying for a service that now doesn’t include Netflix half the time. Absolutely frustrating. Anyone found better for Apple TV?

It's really too weird because yesterday I couldn't find a game with ExpressVPN. So I asked my buddy to put his VPN on (he also has ExpressVPN) and it worked all night. This morning we tried again and my buddy can't find any game with ExpressVPN on Warzone and it's the same bug as me.

Question guys, do you manage to play warzone with another VPN provider?

Thanks

I've tried many VPN providers and I like ExpressVPN the most just because it works. I never have any problems other than getting their client to run in docker or not having WireGuard for manual configuration. But it works on my TV and phone and router. I'm mostly happy and use it when it's necessary.

Using a VPN sounds like a great idea to use 24/7 but honestly it's not necessary when you have things like https, and it will always decrease your speed. However, coming from Europe to the USA, I've had to use a VPN to access certain sites and bypass ISP and mobile carrier throttling. It really sucks and I wish it wasn't necessary. VPNs always seem like a one-off thing to me now.

Unfortunately I think your complaints are just what VPN providers are like and you'll just have to get used to it. But there are alternatives such as that you might like. I've yet to try them.

I've bought and refunded so many other providers and eventually just stuck with ExpressVPN.

Why on earth do you need ExpressVPN for access to the schools INTRANET? The school needs to provide you their own business specific VPN so you can communicate to THE SCHOOLS INTRANET SERVERS, not servers sent via public VPN providers such as ExpressVPN. The IP’s to connect to your school are not public INTERNET addresses but INTRANET addresses which is part of the reason you need the schools VPN.

I use ExpressVPN and am very happy with it. Once connected all internet traffic is rerouted , browser and apps. They also have a router app that will work whole house, I haven't tried it but it gets good reviews

I’m getting that it’s their free versions of their product is open source:

https://adguard.com/en/blog/adguard-open-source-policy.html

But this GitHub shows ALL their products:

https://github.com/AdguardTeam

So I contacted EVPN’s customer service yesterday after refreshing my public IP address failed to connect to HBO Max. They basically asked me to “take it up with HBO themselves as the issue must be on their end.” Sure, I’ll contact HBO and ask them to help me access their app from my location using smart DNS 🙄

I’m enrolled in the 2-week trial of SmartDNS now. As you reported, I can access HBO Max US content just fine. If this works OK, I think I’ll sign up. Might as well begin looking at other options as part of my cancellation of ExpressVPN when my subscription expires next year.

Well... And that timeline kinda lines up with them selling out to former foreign bad guys. I've only ever really needed the geo fencing workout once (thankfully) and it was great for that. Prior to this I felt fairly good about their history and tech record on protecting users too. Without either of those... I'm unsure why anyone would use ExpressVPN these days.

FWIW I'm mad jealous of your speeds. I typically max around 210-250 (diff results all the time so if course it's fluctuating). The times I've tested with WireGuard it was so negligible I would frankly write it off at being a normal fluctuation. Fast enough that my server and personal machine are just ALWAYS connected (something I couldn't reliably do with Express or Proton.

I haven't tried gaming over ExpressVPN but it should be possible from any location of course, unless their servers have been blocked. I would simply try a different VPN provider if I were you, Express has really gone to sh.

This is very suspicious behavior of any company. I wonder why no one mentions this in all the positive reviews many tech news sites have on ExpressVPN. I do not trust a company that refuses to remove my credit card info from their site.

If you set up your router to use OpenVPN to connect, then your router probably can't handle the amount of processing power required to encrypt your connection on the fly. Most routers don't have hardware encryption. For best speed, use the ExpressVPN client on your computer.

I've tried a few since the news broke, but honestly, none of them have been as fast (including Mullvad that everyone is recommending for some reason) so Ima stick with Express and see how this whole thing plays out

Since the recent news, I've switched to Mullvad VPN after being a customer of ExpressVPN for about 3 years. My ExpressVPN subscription renewed a little more than the 30 days ago so definitely out of the money back guarantee. I’ve been using Mullvad for a couple of days now and seems to be good. Best thing about Mullvad is no personal details when signing up and you can pay them with cash via post! Their pricing is great too, no lock ins!

Well I have been with for 5 years with PM mail has a premium user ,and with ProtonVPN for 2 years,and haven't any issue keep in mind if you are doing something Illegal like hacking bank account's or downloading kiddy stuff yes that's is not acceptable, other then that,they have the highest security then any other VPN services on the market.

​

Under Swiss law, we are not obligated to save any user connection logs, nor can we be forced to perform targeted logging on specific users. This allows us to ensure that your private browsing history does, in fact, stay private and cannot be turned over to a third-party under any circumstances. Our no logs policy applies to all our users, including anyone using our free VPN and you tell me of any other VPN has Security

​

Physical Security

We have gone to extreme lengths to protect ProtonVPN's Secure Core servers to ensure their security. Critical infrastructure in Switzerland is located at a high security datacenter outside of Zurich requiring biometric access. Similarly, our Iceland infrastructure resides in a secure former military base. Our servers in Sweden are also located in an underground data center. By shipping our own equipment to these locations, we ensure that our servers are also secure at the hardware level.

I know Windscribe works very well with 10Play. Great for P2P and ad-blocking too.

Hardcore privacy-wise, IVPN and Mullvad are the best. If you need streaming, look at Windscribe or OVPN. Not sure if OVPN works with 10Play though.

annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd it just keeps getting better.

The chief information officer of ExpressVPN among three former US intelligence and military personnel who altogether have been fined more than $1.6 million by the US Department of Justice to resolve hacking-related charges. ExpressVPN CIO Daniel Gericke, as first reported Tuesday by Reuters, is among the three former US intelligence operatives and military members involved in Project Raven who worked as mercenary hackers for the United Arab Emirates, helping it spy on its enemies.

Tested and upgraded. Damn fast. Blocks ads.

I don’t use for torrenting, but to avoid stupid trackers etc. And unblock streaming.

For reference, Mullvad is as fast as express.

It’s a shame I used to love Express VPN - top notch customer support and product.. goodbye.

Not slow at all IMO. I tried out Tunnelbear, Mullvad, Express, TorGuard and ProtonVPN. Speeds were almost the same. With Proton, I'm able to reach 240 of my 250 MBit/s connection all the time, so I don't know where all these complaints come from.

UI is also very nice, and it works very good for streaming too.

I am currently connected to ExpressVPN as I type this, and just logged into Netflix on my same browser and was able to watch whatever I wanted without any errors on my first attempt.

That said, I'm not trying to connect internationally. For what it's worth I'm using Brave. Maybe try a fresh browser session, delete all cookies, etc. Have you tried multiple server locations?

Thank you for your help. I’ve found the issue. When I had changed my VPN location, during the few seconds it was down Google had saved my location. Clearing my cookies then restarting my PC seems to have fixed the issue. Netflix still doesn’t work, but most likely Netflix had discovered and flagged the IP address that ExpressVPN uses. Again, thank you for helping me with my problem.

That's probably because no one uses StrongVPN so NetFlix hasn't flagged them yet.

The newest tactic of NetFlix is just to block the IP address all together so they cannot even access the page (Site cannot be reached - too long to respond).

> they recommended MediaStreamer over using a VPN.

Why tho? Isn't ExpressVPN disclaim themselves MediaStreamer is far more unreliable and doesn't really mask your location that effectively? How was your experience vs the built in VPN on the router? How was the comparison in your experience?

Can you share more details on your setup, because I was really interested on that setup too.

But instead of you dumping your Google Nest WiFi, I would use a VPN router as Passthrough through internet, turn off that Router's WiFi signal, and connect it to my Google Mesh Network, so my VPN WiFi is wide and covers even my future IoT devices.

I assume you're interested on MediaStreamer because of Apple TV's lack of native VPN features right?

It’s a known issue. A number of streaming services started blocking expressvpn servers a few weeks back. ExpressVPN is aware of the issue and they claim they’re working on it.

I’ve had the same issue for weeks but it looks like it’s working now. Try again and see if it works.

If that still doesn’t work there’s a workaround that I’ve tried 1. Since you have an Apple TV I’m assuming you also have an iOS device 2. Run the expressvpn app on your device (try San Francisco) and run Disney plus. 3. Play the video then try to do screen mirroring so it plays on your tv instead.

This worked for me for the last couple of weeks. It was annoying but t was better than nothing.

I had similar issues a few weeks back using media streamer on my Apple TV 4K (Disney Plus and Hulu region locked, HBO Max not loading). They gave me the same reason.

Not sure if you and I have the same settings but HBO Max and Hulu issues were resolved last week. And just today I was able to load Disney Plus.

As for ExpressVPN app, try San Francisco. I’ve been using it for the last couple weeks as a workaround to the mediastreamer issue. Seems to be working fine all those services.

You mean that Chinese students are blocked by GFW and cannot use online learning platforms. At present, ExpressVPN can indeed help students in mainland China connect to foreign platforms. This does not require a Chinese server.

When you live in a foreign country (such as the United States, the United Kingdom, etc.), you need to access websites in mainland China, and these websites are reversely blocked by GFW. At this time, you need servers in China to achieve this.

You can follow this website, it can help you understand this problem. And what VPNs can students in mainland China use to access foreign websites:

I didn’t have any issues with Netflix but HBO max was not liking any of the VPN servers that ExpressVPN had to offer .

I switched to a competitor (keeping both VPN services) and was able to get through a full movie with HBO Max last night. The competitor seems a tad bit slower loading but happy to have access after watching Space Jam.

I am keeping express VPN around for its media streamer dns which seems to work with all except HBO and then turning on the competitor VPN to watch HBO max

Hbo max seems to be blocking a bunch of the VPN servers from ExpressVPN. Also the Smart DNS is not working with HBO Max either. I added another VPN service and I now have access again. Though it is a bit slower than ExpressVPN

I have the impression that some asshole at Google/YouTube flagged my account (which is 15 years old)... Because I do get American ads, but I'm still forced to verify. I just tried using another account and it works with ExpressVPN. Thanks for the help.

If you put it in the settings of the application Connect automatically it does that too.

Now if you are Internet Access (Block Internet if unable to connect or reconnect to VPN) I recommend leaving this enabled.

Now if you are like me who uses it 24/7, I recommend putting it too (Block internet traffic outside the VPN) it will open the Android settings there you select ExpressVPN in the option (Always Active and Block connections without VPN). I use these settings 24/7 for privacy and security so all traffic goes through the VPN servers. I'm using Lightway UDP protocol which for me is great.

Both work fine for US shows streaming from outside like Netflix and such.

ExpressVPN support will tell you to connect to some special servers, but with NordVPN you can connect to any of them.

But I've tried both w/o issues from Europe or Middle East.

It's streaming over http, I guess. :D Yeah, definitely http. IGMP feature you say, what exactly I have to do except checking does my router have it? Enable it, disable it, configure it specifically to get better VPN speed?

I mean, it's strange, if I connect to VPN and try playing YouTube it's ok, 1080p plays just fine but with IPTV, mostly 1920x1080@50fps channels with Bitrate of 5-7Mbps. So, if I have 20Mbps internet connection, I am absolutely sure ExpressVPN can handle 20Mbps just fine, it's the best VPN ever. And then when I watch IPTV I have buffering, very short buffering like bandwidth is barely enough to support that one channel.

And this was not tested on some unknown shady providers. From those I tested I know exactly from which country they originate from, and as I said I tested all ExpressVPN servers and ended up with same results.

VPN server closest to me, VPN server closest to provider, it's like bandwidth doesn't go above 5Mbps which is just not enough to keep up with FHD channel.

Btw it's Android TV 9 device over LAN, without VPN enabled connection is perfectly stable with like 99% capped on 20-21Mbps.

This is from ExpressVPN:

Hello. The iOS widget has been temporarily removed on the latest version, but we do plan on adding it back in the future versions of our app. No ETA yet at the moment though.

That sounds more like an issue with stick than the VPN. As much as it's a pain, I would be inclined to do a factory reset on the stick, then install the VPN and get it active, then install iPlayer (so it thinks you are in the UK during the install).

Normally iPlayer launches for me, but if the VPN is not active gives an error when you start to play something. The error seems device specific, sometimes it just tells you you are in the the wrong country, other times it is something obscure.

The problems I have are when it is actually streaming. I think I have worked out that part of it is just poor design in iPlayer - it is not nearly as smart in its bandwidth handling and buffering than other streaming services like Netflix or Amazon - and in part how the VPN interacts with my connection (which is prone to occasional dropouts). NordVPN is definitely better than ExpressVPN for iPlayer, but is still not perfect, but whereas with Express it is often more or less unusable with pauses every minute or so, with Nord it might hiccup only once or twice an hour.

Dan, I am a subscriber to ExpressVPN and use it on different OS’s. MacBooks, iPhones, iPads, and a few Linux IOT devices. Your customer support truly, and I cannot emphasize this enough, needs some training as one of your staff didn’t even know it ran on Linux! That’s not a good sign.

I tried the same thing and couldn't figure it out (also in Chicago) using that same video demo. Finally called VPN customer service and they say that you cannot add express vpn to the apple tv streaming box - you would have to add ExpressVPN directly to your router if you use apple tv, which I didn't want to do. I also have a Amazon FireStick streaming device , and the E-VPN rep said Firestick does allow you to load an E-VPN app onto the Amazon Firestick as an app and use it that way (without having to set it up on your router). So I did just that, and can now change my location to Washington, DC on my Amazon Firestick streaming. I'm now waiting for the games to start this week to know for sure this works, but I'm hopeful it will. Hope this helps - Good luck.

Same on PIA VPN today. Found this post via a Google search for the same thing.

This happened before when I was using ExpressVPN. It means they have done a sweep of known VPN IPs and blocked them. So you get this while connected to them. The reason why I switched to PIA was because it happened before on ExpressVPN about a year ago. All you can really do is report it to ExpressVPN and try another VPN.

My only complaint about ExpressVPN - it lacks open ports. Which makes it useless for torrenting. Other than that it has decent ping and fast servers. They have often packet losses, but you can’t have everything right

[UPDATE FROM EXPRESSVPN]

Thanks a lot for trying our suggestions.

We've just informed that this might be an issue and it has been escalated to the appropriate team. 

I've also checked but it appears that Jojos Bizzare Adventures is no longer available on Netflix, thus, you can't find it even while connected to the VPN. 

In the meantime, may we know if you wish to access other shows or movies so that we can try to look into other regions for you to access? You may also try visiting this 3rd party website where you can check the content you want to see on Netflix to determine which country has it. Please be advised that ExpressVPN is not affiliated with this site and is not responsible for any misinformation listed in it. If you are okay with it, you may go to  and search by the title.

We'll be sending you an email confirmation once we've got a resolution on our end. Thank you for your understanding. Have a nice day! 

I think the issue that even with split tunneling enabled, the non-VPN traffic uses ExpressVPN DNS to resolve. AFAIK, there's no way around that at the moment.

Maybe using two different devices, one with the VPN and one without. Not oh well...

I don’t know why. By the two domains I listed in the post earlier. By could’ve been resolved by ExpressVPN. I posted that 8hrs ago. That could be why your not seeing it on blacklist checkers. 8hrs ago this two domains were listed on WhatIsMyIPAddress dot com and other similar sites.

Not yet. I’ve tried an alternative IP, restarted and Hulu is still blocked. Interestingly, ATV and Netflix working with no problem.

I was onto ExpressVPN support and he wasn’t aware of any known issues and just gave me the config FAQ link..

G'day all. Like everyone else here, I've been suffering big time without my Kayo fix for the last few weeks. It had been working perfectly for the last 2 years with Express. I really dont want to look for another sports streaming service because in my 15 years of living abroad, I've tried plenty & none of them come close to the Kayo set up. Anyway, I couldn't hold out any longer & signed up to NordVPN for a month yesterday. After 24 hours of testing & as others have already said, I'm not too impressed so far. A lot of fluctuating in quality & mostly sticking around the 360p level with some buffering to go with it. In my own experience, Express is light years ahead. Always streaming at 1080 down to 720 occasionally & never any buffering. It can't come back soon enough, although with the same generic responses we've all been getting from support Im not holding my breath :( Cheers

I second @rafikiphoto’s comment. ExpreessVPN is aware and sent an update with suggestions on how to get around the problem in the meantime. I was surprised to see their response, as there must be enough people connecting to the UK. I previously reached out about Australia blocking anyone from the US and they did nothing about it.

In the meantime I got an additional subscription to NordVPN which seems to be much better at connecting with BBC and BBC iplayer. It even has more servers to connect to.

No. Using a VPN seriously undermines the anonymity or TOR. Essentially, it creates a permanent entry node with a money trail attached. ExpressVPN has a product to sell. Marketing and integrity don't mix.

Can confirm this, iPhone 7 here. It's about 35%. Frankly it's the only downside I've found on ExpressVPN.

I tested other VPNs, Mullvad for example, with Wireguard and saw a HUGE improvement in regards of battery usage. Maybe we see an improvement with their new Lightway protocol?

Yea, like others said, you’re guaranteed to have a reduction in speed when using a VPN, but ExpressVPN has been solid for me. I have 200 Mbps internet through my ISP and get between 100-115 Mbps when connected to ExpressVPN.

EDIT: Speeds are also better when I’m connected to a server that’s closest to my actual location.

To back-up the opening poster's comment... it will help if everyone can get a ‘feature request’ raised with ExpressVPN. If they get enough asks, they'll prioritize resolving this problem. Chat support will ask you to try several steps (just advise that you're having the same problem for each) and they'll add another ticket to the feature request.

This will help, hope everyone can take the 15 minutes to do this...

- The way you should do it is to test your internet speed on your laptop w/o VPN (note that down)

- Then you install expressVPN on your laptop and test the internet speed and compare the results (you shouldn't lose too much speed on i7)

- For router, you need a router that has crypto hardware acceleration, like latest asus routers preferably running with Merlin firmware, you'll get as much speed as your speed as your laptop (minus 10-15%) using an openvpn file (usually best to connect to a server close to you)

ExpressVPN support won't help you much with speeds unless you get one their routers, I basically did everything on my own and fyi - stay away from their routers.

I have had that some problem for a long time when trying to access the Sprint website to pay the monthly invoice. I have to remember to turn off VPN for my desktop for a few minutes. I expect that sometime someone used ExpressVPN addresses for activity that Sprint's security team decided warranted adding the addresses to their blacklist. I suspect that it may be a common problem with many VPN users, no matter which VPN service being used.

This should be possible. Don’t listen to the other guy. He seems to think you are trying to establish inbound connections. When ExpressVPN connects you’ll see a route entry added. You need to fix that so that not everything routes through the vpn. I don’t think split tunneling like that is native as an option in the Linux client, but you can do it by manipulating the routing tables and ensuring only dns traffic routes to the ExpressVPN IP. But honestly, you are better off just doing DoH if you don’t want your isp to see your dns traffic since it’s less complicated in this case. You can use a service like cloudflared.

I thought I had it setup right. Apparently, I needed to check the "Connect to the last used... when ExpressVPN is launched." That fixed my problem. I was stupid to not try that in the first place. I'll leave this up in case anyone else searches this problem.

Well all that’s good to hear. The battery life on my iPhone for now is great but my iPad battery is a bit worn so Defo will be great for watching American Netflix on it.

I’ve found it connects for me on all networks, on my school network NordVPN and ExpressVPN don’t let you login and Nord doesn’t connect but express does.

Recently had an issue with the iOS app where it drops VPN connection when I put my phone to sleep but I contacted them and they said they’re aware so hopefully this update that just came out fixes it as haven’t checked yet.

I just checked the ExpressVPN website. It doesn’t seem to have any ad blocking capabilities.

My recommendation is:

For PC, use the uBlock Origin browser extension.

For everything else, use AdGuard’s DNS

Here’s how I solved this problem. I changed about the only thing you can change in the iOS app: the connection protocol. By setting it to “automatic,” it was preferring IKEv2. Changing that to IPsec means that now my Apple Mail program connects to, sends, and receives from my iCloud account. It never had problems with gmail or my Exchange server, but iCloud does not seem to like IKEv2.

My experience with ExpressVPN Customer Service was very unproductive, unfortunately. The answers focused on “this is supposed to happen because we must think your iCloud connection isn’t secure” and finally “set the e-mail connection port to 587”. Really? I’m on an iPhone.

Anyway, very happy that I can go back to using Mail again... I tried and wanted to love iOS Outlook, but it... was... awful. How can it be that it can’t come close to the default email program on my iPhone?

The iOS and Android apps, seem to be the ExpressVPN app’s that drain the battery a lot, especially if you use the OpenVPN protocol via UDP or TCP, which makes sense since this is the strongest encryption protocol of them all... Now IKEv2/IPSec protocol (which is still military grade encryption, using AES-256) is not as bad. However, Android ExpressVPN only has OpenVPN (UDP or TCP).

> Depends on the router and firmware.

^This exactly.

I personally use ExpressVPN with their OpenVPN configuration on my DIY pfSense router. Works great and you are not limited to how many devices utilize the VPN tunnel like you are when using the app on each of your devices.

First and foremost, when you can, ditch Windows 10. It’s a privacy nightmare, in and of itself, making ExpressVPN less effective at preserving your privacy and anonymity.

(Get a Mac! I can’t believe how I ever used Windows, after I switched to MacOS.)

Anywho,

• What web browser are you using?

• What VPN protocol are you using on the Windows ExpressVPN APP?

Avoid Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer.

Use Firefox!!

Try the OpenVPN TCP protocol, though may be slower, it’s usually not that much slower, and tends to work when all other protocols fail, and TCP ensures a greater level of reliability.

Also, do you have the network kill switch enabled or disabled?

Let us know any more details, to help us assist you, after trying these steps.

———-

If there’s still issues after this, we may need to look into your network adapter settings on one thing at a time.

I haven't used Express for about three weeks now, I bought one month with Astrill and it's hands down the better option.

We have BroadNetcom (I know, I know, gf bought it, not me) as our ISP here in the Beijing, and Express just refuses to work, if I can get 100kb/sec it's been a good day. Astrill has the StealthVPN as standard now along with WireGuard in their client. For me Express has to start supplying TCP certificates for Tunnelblick so that users can configure their own obfsproxy or the obfuscation that they have desperately needs to improve.

Damn good question! I have been using express for 2 years now. This last 6 months due to crack downs from the ...(redacted) ... my ExpressVPN has been, on some days, unbearable. Last year I sang it’s praises! This last 6 months it drops connection so often it can be hard to use!

Usually things get better here a week or 2 after party meetings and like but this time it hasn’t really! I am giving serious thought to changing to Nord or Astril! What happened to Vyper?

Sound advice. I had already did that, and only connect with openvpn. However, I didn't remove the ExpressVPN application.

I found it very curious that it was trying to contact those sites, even without a VPN connection via the app itself.

As I mentioned below, they seem to want me to think it is a 'health check'.

I cancelled my NordVPN because of performance and connection issues. I got ExpressVPN in its place on Feb 21, 2019 and have run quite a few tests on it. I always get a good performance. ExpressVPN is the only one of about 6 or so that I have tried that I am actually happy with. PM me for more info.

Get what you pay for I guess. I've used ExpressVPN for over 2 years now and am renewing for a third this month. I use it all the time on 2 computers and my shield and have never had a server go down or slow down my connection. I wish it was cheaper and I wish I could have more than 3 devices at a time but it is a quality product.

Do you use iOS or Android?

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On iOS, you can use AdGuard and ExpressVPN simultaneously by setting the connection protocol in the ExpressVPN menu to "IKEv2" - just make sure are both turned on in your phone VPN menu. When ExpressVPN is set to IKEv2, it will appear in the lower VPN section under "Personal VPN Apps" and AdGuard will remain in the top under VPN Configurations, and this allows both to run simultaneously.

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I have been doing this for months without issue.

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Cheers

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EDIT: I just saw you are running Android. In that case, you'll have to set up the AdGuard application to Adblock as a proxy instead of a local VPN. Make sure you have downloaded the AdGuard .apk from the AdGuard website instead of the Google Play Store version to do this.

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Cheers

Just make sure you turn on the kill switch option in the client, and if possible, meaning if the program/app allows, try to bind the network interface that ExpressVPN is connected through to those apps, for example, I bind the network adapter that is created and used by ExpressVPN to my torrent client.

What they can ALWAYS see, whether it's your employer or the ISP of your employer is WHO you are connecting to.

The "what" in the middle depends on whether you have encryption or not, in this case, you do since ExpressVPN uses encryption.

There are network monitoring tools that can read the content of the payload and even deciper some, but if it's strongly encrypted, it wouldn't know what you were doing, all it can see is packets going and coming from the IP address you are connected to (one of ExpressVPN's servers) and you.

Here's the caveat. Nothing I stated guarantees you are safe. You must read your own employee's handbook and read about the rules regarding data/internet usage. Another important aspect is, if you are on company computer, and even if you installed ExpressVPN and your traffic is encrypted, there could be a data/activity logging installed on that machine and it's not a violation of privacy since it's company property.

My advice is, if you are not using company computer but using their WiFi, just don't. Use cellular (if it's your mobile) and just stay away from company infrastructure.

I want it on my phone for when I’m on unsecured WiFi. I want it at home for my other devices. And I don’t want to have to remember to keep turning it off and on. I get ExpressVPN not working with a different vpn but this is just another layer of ExpressVPN. How can that not work?

I was fine with ExpressVPN, but they're not in enough US cities for me. SurfsharkVPN is better in that regard. But I dumped both of them because they disabled the L2TP protocol and tried forcing me into buying a new browser. So I went to BulletVPN. But I definitely second the suggestion to buy monthly because these companies flip on a dime and you'll be caught out of luck and money if they make changes while you're on a long subscription.

Never a good option to run a VPN inside a VPN.

Get the ExpressVPN router from Amazon, or flash their firmware on a compatible router. Then use the device policy routing to exclude your office laptop from the VPN tunnel, while tunneling ALL other devices through ExpressVPN

On my Windows 10 desktop:

My download speed with ExpressVPN- 254 Mbps

My download speed without ExpressVPN - 895 Mbps

I'm using an Arris Surfboard S3 modem and ASUS router. 254Mbps is more than sufficient for what I need to do. I don't do online gaming or watch movies on my desktop. At some point, I may dump the router/modem as they are aging and go with the native Xfinity or ATT equipment.

What IP address did you use for the DNS at the beginning? I removed the ExpressVPN one and chose automatic previously in order to get the code and login to Prime Video but as soon as I used the ExpressVPN DNS I got the black screen.

I'm having the same issue on Mac OS Ventura. I think it isn't setting up DNS correctly. I have a brand new Mac Studio (just a few hours old) with nothing but the out-of-the-box software installed / upgraded to Mac OS Ventura.

Installed ExpressVPN and it won't work out of the box, on any server. However my iPad and phone on the same wifi work with all the protocols.

The only solution for me on the Mac is IKEV2 protocol. That seems to work 100% of the time.

All other VPN software (OpenVPN, NordVPN, etc) work fine. It seems like a bug in their app that they need to solve.

Hi all. I have tried NordVPN after paying £88 and I am still having the same issue :( I have also tried a network reset on my iPhone. So it must be that my isp is limiting my usage but why when I am using a VPN?

Exact same here with Prime Video and the QR code - never seen that happen before so they’ve upped their DNS detection. Using the VPN app works though but I want it via. Mediastreamer DNS. If we all can submit a ticket so ExpressVPN can work on it.

Uh yeah, sure mate. The national average internet speed in 2022 is 119.03 Mbps.

This is a list of the US states that have the fastest average internet speed:

Maryland - 196.2 Mbps

Virginia - 193.1 Mbps

New York - 190.5 Mbps

Massachusetts - 188.2 Mbps

New Jersey - 174.3 Mbps

Connecticut - 172 Mbps

Illinois - 171.3 Mbps

Oklahoma - 168.8 Mbps

Colorado - 168.5 Mbps

Florida - 167.8 Mbps

Notice anything about those speeds compared to yours? You are in an unusual situation. All over the world there are people who have lower internet speeds than you. Your speed is unusually high for anywhere. Not everyone lives next to a major fiber hub.

That said, your web speed is irrelevant to my point, so nice Straw Man fallacy you have there. Did it come with a corncob pipe and straw hat? Because YOUR speed has nothing to do with my post.

The fact is that a VPN user ought to lose no more than 20% of their normal speed. If they lose more than that then either there are issues (bad weather, fiber break, data going through backhaul) or the VPN in question sucks ass. My speed of 24 to 25 drops to less than 1/3 the normal speed when connected to ExpressVPN. Reliably.

Now I do indeed live in fuckall noplace and I have satellite internet. Guess what? Other VPNs work just fine under those circumstances. They sorta have to. Piping data through a different route is not a big ask.

As a person who spent a long time working in I.T. maybe you don;t understand something I do.

When running a test to figure out what's wrong - if nothing at all changes in how you set up a test other than one piece of the puzzle... and whenever you do change that one thing the results suck ass.

But - when you do not do that one problematic thing you get standard reliable results. Then the probability is very high that the fault lies in the ONE THING, which in this case is connecting to ExpressVPN.

Astrill works well, but they just raised their prices again. 30$(from 25) on the one month plan and 20$(from 12.50) per month on the one year plan. Expressvpn is almost unusable for me aswell at the moment.

I have UK and USA working fine in Australia. I use Apple TV. iPhones. MacBook etc and can stream Peacock on all devices. For Peacock you just need to set the VPN to a specific city for iPhone and MacBook. (The ExpressVPN team will tell you)

For Apple TV the DNS settings work fine. Occasionally they will drop off and I need to log into the ExpressVPN site and refresh them.

I'm subscribed to both Express and Astrill. Express update their app almost every week, but it never gets any more stable in my personal experience. Astrill rarely updates anything, and is very expensive, but for me, I've got a lot more connection time with them over the past 6 months than i have with Express.

I honestly don't know why Astrill never features in those 'Best VPN 2022' articles. Even on 'established' sites, they don't even make the top 10. 100% they will feature in those useless paid articles, but they never get mentioned in the supposedly 'independent' ones.

Anyone, just my two cents. If you actually need a VPN, get more than one. If you can afford it, consider Astrill (while knowing none will ever be 100% stable.)

From ExpressVPN v10:

for Windows 7, 8, 10, and 11

(Has all the features, but less optimized for Lightway protocol)

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From ExpressVPN v12:

for Windows 10 and 11

Download Early Preview Version

(Optimized for Lightway, but without some features, such as the Speed Test tool)

There was a 2-year-old post above that mentioned that this issue doesn't happen when using ExpressVPN on their router. ExpressVPN just deprecated L2TP on my router so I removed it and started using the app on each device. That's when this mess started for me. Maybe I'll hve to investigate replacing my router with one where ExpressVPN can run 'internally'.

Try downloading TOR, then carry out the following actions:
1) Get an OBFS Bridge from
2) Join the TOR network, experiment with various bridges, and attempt to obtain a bridge over port 443
3) Change the SOCKS 127.0.0.1:9150 proxy configuration in Windows, sign in to ExpressVPN, disable the proxy, and then try to connect to ExpressVPN. They might work because it allows you to login to express unrestricted. Remember to turn off the proxy setting afterward.