Trusted Reviews is supported by its audience. If you purchase through links on our site, we may earn a commission.Learn more.
ExpressVPN Review
An expensive but fast and reliable service with a wide array of features
In This Article
Verdict
ExpressVPN is an expensive but fast and reliable service with a wide array of features.
Pros
Cons
ExpressVPN – Save 82%
Save 82% with ExpressVPN, now from just £3.88 per month for 12 months with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Key Features
Introduction
ExpressVPN is among the most forward-thinking VPN providers, with regular feature and security updates to its service and applications, and a track record of user security.
The company was bought in 2021 by Kape Technologies, which has also acquired a number of other VPN firms, includingCyberGhostandPrivate Internet Access, and review sites such as vpnMentor.
I’m pleased to see that, under new ownership, ExpressVPN has continued with privacy-friendly practices, such asindependent security auditsfrom Cure53 and F-Secure.
ExpressVPN’s strong performance and established infrastructure mean that it remains one of thebest VPNservices you’re likely to see. It’s stable, versatile and feature-packed, with clients and documentation for a wide range of devices and operating systems.
Pricing and subscriptions
ExpressVPN is expensive, but doesn’t come with any hidden costs or unexpected price hikes upon renewal.
The price of an ExpressVPN subscription – which has never been cheap – has gone up in recent months. You’ll pay £10.55/$12.95 per month, £48.83/$59.95 for six months, or £81.41/$99.99 per year. If you’re after anonymous payment options, you can buy your subscription with Bitcoin.
There’s no free trial, but you do get a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Privacy and Protection
Of all the stable of VPNs that Kape Technologies has bought over the years, ExpressVPN is the most privacy away and cutting-edge, a status it has kept since being bought under a cloud of awkward news one of the company’s – now former – board members was being investigated by the FBI for working for a mercenary intelligence unitspyingon critics of the UAE.
Although Kape is based in the UK, ExpressVPN is headquartered in the British Virgin Islands, which doesn’tsharethe UK’s strict data retention laws. Under Kape’s ownership, ExpressVPN continues to have a clearly statedno-logging policy. The policy was proven in 2017, when ExpressVPN’s Turkish endpoint servers were seized and no logs were found on the systems.
However, until a seizure or a court order re-proves the point under new ownership, I’ll regard the current incarnation of ExpressVPN as having an unproven no-logging policy despite Kape’s stated hands-off management style.
Since 2019, all ExpressVPN servers have used RAM disks that are automatically wiped on reboot, rather than hard disks from which data could be more easily retrieved in case of server seizures.
Recent additions to the service’s privacy measures include adding post-quantum protection measures to its Lightway protocol, and less dramatic but nonetheless useful quality of life changes such as automatic updates to the desktop clients.
ExpressVPN doesn’t publish a warrant canary to provide an immediate update if they are compelled to hand over user data, but instead produces a regulartransparency report, as well as regularauditsof its software and protocols.
Features and Usability
Clients are available for Windows, macOS, the Linux command line, Android and iOS, plus the Kindle Fire and FireTV Android variants. Desktop and command line Linux users can also control the service via browser plugins for Chrome, Firefox and Safari. Recent updates have added – a somewhat unnecessary – password manager to the mobile apps and Chrome browser extension, native Apple Silicon support, and an Apple TV.
ExpressVPN has always packed in a lot of extra features, and the current Windows client includes options to block trackers, malicious sites, ads and adult sites. It uses ExpresVPN’s own Lightway protocol and the tried-and-tested OpenVPN.
Manual configuration options are also available. ExpressVPN doesn’t currently support the WireGuard protocol.
ExpressVPN used to limit users to five simultaneously connected devices, but this has been upgraded to eight, better reflecting the sheer amount of hardware many tech enthusiasts and their households have running.
Performance
ExpressVPN didn’t come at the very top of our test results this time around, but it has before and has been consistently among the fastest services for over a year now, alongside the likes of Mulvad, NordVPN, ProtonVPN and Tunnelbear.
With speeds of 278.4Mbit/s from the UK, 294.4Mbit/s from the Netherlands, and 195.2Mbit/s from the US, you won’t have to compromise throughput for security.
It’s also better for streaming while connected to a VPN than some rival services, so you don’t have to use split tunnelling or disconnect from the service when you want to want iPlayer or Netflix.
Latest deals
Buy ExpressVPN from £6.78 per month
Should you buy it?
You want a reliable and speedy connection:ExpressVPN achieved above-average speeds in our performance tests, while also supporting a wide range of devices.
You want a cheap VPN:ExpressVPN is a long way from being the cheapest VPN currently available, with almost every service except niche specialistPerfect Privacycosting significantly less.
Final Thoughts
ExpressVPN is far from being a budget choice, but this VPN service’s fast speed-test results and features such as RAM-disk servers remain solid credentials.
ProtonVPN– which is more costly at its standard price – outperformed it in some categories. While if security is more important for you than speed, check outPerfect Privacyinstead.
If you’re on a budget,Surfsharkcosts less than ExpressVPN, even after its new-user discount no longer applies, and performs comparably. ExpressVPN’s stablemate,Private Internet Access, isn’t as fast, but it’s even cheaper.
ExpressVPN remains an excellent, if pricey, consumer VPN, and is one of the few big names to implement post-quantum protection measures.
How we test
All speed tests are run across a fibre connection with a maximum tested connection speed of 980Mbps, which means that we’re able to get a good idea of the upper threshold of each VPN service’s speed at the time of testing.
We test multiple endpoints from each provider in three locations: the UK, the Netherlands and the US.
We research security and no-logging claims.
We inventory and test client features on Windows and Linux.
You might like…
FAQs
No, you need to pay a subscription fee in order to use ExpressVPN, although there is a 30-day money-back guarantee.
ExpressVPN costs £10.19/$12.95 a month, £47.10/$59.95 for six months, and £84.06/$99.99 per year.
K.G. Orphanides is a writer and developer whose areas of expertise include internet security, VPNs, Linux for the desktop, small-scale game development, software preservation and computer audio techno…
Founded in 2003, Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy.
Today, we have millions of users a month from around the world, and assess more than 1,000 products a year.
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
Why trust our journalism?
Founded in 2003, Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy.
Today, we have millions of users a month from around the world, and assess more than 1,000 products a year.
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
