Your connection will be encrypted regardless of which tunneling protocol you pick. Overall, this is a strong encryption suite, but it doesn’t go as far as some others. This is the standard in the VPN industry, albeit some take it up a notch with SHA-512. Hotspot Shield uses the secure SHA-256 hash function for authentication. Since Hotspot Shield has speed as a top priority, the faster AES-128 is understandable. With that said, most VPNs opt for the more secure AES-256 cipher. There are just too many variables even for modern computers to figure out, so decrypting it would take an indefinite amount of time. Many governmental and financial institutions adopted it for classified documents. For that, it uses the AES-128-CBC cipher, widely regarded as uncrackable. Hotspot Shield will not only hide your IP address but will also encrypt the connection between your device and the VPN server. All of this makes it difficult to evaluate whether your online activity will remain anonymous. However, when we look at their business location and owners, there’s a lot of questions that are left unanswered.
No DNS leaks, strong encryption, and proprietary tunneling protocols guarantee your security.
Hotspot Shield is a safe VPN service from a technical standpoint. Thus, while the speed test score is not as impressive as one might expect, we may have just been unlucky.
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW DOWNLOAD#
Note that there are multiple factors that influence how fast you can download various files, like the number and location of seeds. We’ve tested the download speed and it got up to 2.3MB/s (18mbps). Even though there are no dedicated servers strictly for torrenting, its 3,200+ servers give a relatively large number of options to find a fast and secure connection for P2P downloads. Hotspot Shield VPN can be used for torrenting as it doesn’t blacklist P2P connections. Although it’s a niche streaming service, it has harsh anti-VPN measures that only few providers can bypass. Otherwise, the streaming quality was good, and we didn’t experience any stutters.īut like many others before it, Hotspot Shield couldn’t access DAZN. It did unblock BBC iPlayer, but there was some buffering at the beginning. However, we stumbled upon some issues when accessing other streaming platforms. Just keep in mind that after entering your password, Google will ask to confirm your identity – the service sometimes tends to get a bit sensitive to unfamiliar IPs. Hotspot Shield VPN also easily unblocked YouTube, so you can access trending videos from all around the world. The overall experience watching Netflix was so smooth that it would be pretty hard for anyone to tell whether one’s using a VPN at all.
#HOTSPOT SHIELD FREE VPN REVIEW SERIES#
During the test, the newest movies and TV series loaded instantly with no image quality loss. So, you can pick any of the streaming servers to watch movies or TV shows you want, despite their location-based restrictions.įor example, we had no issues with unblocking the US Netflix library. It has over 3,200 servers across more than 80 different countries. Hotspot Shield is a great VPN to help you access geo-blocked content on major streaming platforms. Streaming: does Hotspot Shield work with Netflix? They range from 0% up to 95% with an average of approximately 80% reduction. Maybe we should thank the Catapult Hydra protocol, but there is no doubt why this VPN won Ookla’s speed badge – the download speed amplitude ranges from 1% to 28% drop with an average 15% drop-off.Įven though the upload speed is slightly slower, the numbers are still impressive. Hotspot Shield VPN’s speeds are honestly impressive. Speed performance: Is Hotspot Shield fast? There is also no VPN kill switch for macOS, Android, or iOS, which is a major security flaw for such a popular VPN. The company does have a controversial past when it comes to user privacy, though. Hotspot Shield has the fastest connection speeds we’ve seen, thanks to Hydra VPN, its proprietary encryption protocol.Īlso, all the apps are user-friendly, stream US Netflix, and allow P2P and torrenting traffic on all servers. In this review, we put both the free and the paid versions of the VPN through our strict testing process to see how they performed for speed, security, streaming, and more. Upgrading to the paid version removes ads and gives you unlimited bandwidth, access to servers in 80 countries, and a range of bundled security features. Hotspot Shield Free is an ad-sponsored VPN with a daily data limit of 500MB. With over 650 million customers, it’s one of the most popular VPN services in the world.
Hotspot Shield offers two services: a free VPN and a premium VPN.