Update after one year of use.
I can safely say that the best VPN is Windscribe.
Proton has always given me some connection problems with WireGuard on iOS and also Linux.
Since finding reliable information about VPNs is really difficult, I decided to tell you about my experience as a user.
Let me start by saying that I don’t find much use in a VPN, but sometimes, like many others, I had to download some files that I shouldn’t, so I preferred to get a VPN subscription.
So a few years ago, I took Ivacy, because it had a lifetime offer.
How did I find it?
Well, I used it very rarely.
It connected immediately from Mac or iPhone, but it had a flaw: every now and then, it disconnected if the line was not very stable.
I’ve never done anything strange with my computer, so it didn’t bother me, but I realize that for a VPN service, this isn’t a good thing.
I never managed to get it to work on the Fire TV, and then I got an Apple TV and moved abroad.
Now I needed a VPN.
Before September, the Apple TV didn’t have VPNs enabled, so I found a solution: OpenWRT.
I purchased a router and configured it.
I didn’t have the faintest idea how to do it, but I did it.
Since Ivacy didn’t have the WireGuard protocol, I had to look around and do some research and testing.
Which VPN did I choose initially?
Surfshark.
I have to say that the choice was perfect.
I have nothing to complain about.
Simple setup and the best tutorials to set up WireGuard.
Since I read that Surfshark is part of the NordVPN group and I don’t trust these commercial VPNs very much (also because I saw in my account that they track all device accesses), I removed the software on my PC and phone and learned how to configure WireGuard and OpenVPN.
In almost 4 months, I have nothing to complain about.
Excellent speed and reliability.
Since I had learned to use WireGuard, I wanted to test other VPNs.
There are very few that offer manual WireGuard setup.
As a second VPN, I tried Windscribe.
I rate it at the same level as Surfshark. Slightly less fast, but it manages to unblock streaming better.
In the sense that Disney+ with Surfshark didn’t show me exactly the catalog of my country, with Windscribe it did.
Between Surfshark and Windscribe, I prefer Windscribe only because it seems more reliable and secure and offers me advantages over streaming.
But there is a problem here too. The company is based in Canada, and I don’t really trust the Canadian government when it comes to privacy.
So I tried Mullvad.
I felt good about it. It is reliable and fast.
It’s very easy to set up WireGuard keys and also OpenVPN, but it doesn’t work well with streaming, so I don’t care.
And with Mullvad, I had a problem.
When I connected with the WireGuard app on the servers in Switzerland, sometimes my position was shown as Panama, and the connection and the ping were very slow.
Then I took Proton VPN, which seems like a fair compromise to me.
I think it’s better than Windscribe on privacy because it’s in Switzerland, and I liked it because it’s the only one that lets you configure an ad blocker directly in the WireGuard configuration file.
As far as I know, no other VPNs have this feature.
I use NextDNS and Brave, but I find the Proton service extremely convenient.
Compared to Surfshark and Windscribe, however, I find it slower.
On speed: Surfshark > Windscribe > Proton.
Proton on streaming works exactly like Windscribe (better than Surfshark for my region).
Finally, since WireGuard doesn’t release its app for Apple TV and the companies mentioned above haven’t released their apps either, I wanted to try another VPN.
PureVPN.
I got it because it had configurable WireGuard.
In terms of quality, it is the worst.
It is at the same level as Ivacy, but Ivacy is better between the two because it costs less. WireGuard configuration files expire after 15 minutes.
It seems like a joke, but it’s true.
Torguard does the same too, so I won’t try it.
Even though it is convenient because it has the app on the Apple TV, I don’t use it because it is much worse than the others.
Slower and unable to unlock everything.
It was a terrible purchase.
So to recap:
If you want a convenient and cheap VPN, you can get Surfshark.
If you want to have a higher level of privacy and transparency: Windscribe. If you care about privacy and have a higher budget: Proton.
Other notable VPNs that I haven’t tried, but would try are AirVPN, OVPN, and IVPN. I hope this post helps someone.