The best VPNs always route all your web traffic through an encrypted connection to a remote server and fend off the cyber threats that latch on every time you go online. Surfshark VPN follows up on this and racks up our list of the best VPN services of 2023. Although, not a free VPN provider the company gets you a good bang for your buck with its unique features like Surfshark Alert, Surfshark Search, and Surfshark Nexus. Unlimited device connections, 30-day money-back guarantee, Camouflage Mode, MultiHop, servers worldwide, and excellent connection speeds make this the most likely choice for users to setup and login to VPN on Windows.
Unlike NordVPN, we do not see certain advanced features like access to Tor via VPN as well as a dedicated IP address (for purchase) in this premium VPN service. But, the company has been working to assign you a new IP address periodically without breaking your connection. We look forward to these changes as they roll out. As of now, we are convinced with its privacy features and no logging policy. Surfshark VPN for Windows has also backed up its claims with third-party audits like Cure53.
Surfshark VPN Free Trial?
Surfshark Download Windows offers a seven-day free VPN trial for Android, iOS, and macOS platforms. If you’re not happy with the service, you can get a full refund within 30 days of your purchase.
How Much Does Surfshark VPN Cost?
Compared to the average price of $9.90 per month, Surfshark VPN’s subscription costs $12.95 per month. This puts it on the pricier spectrum, followed by ExpressVPN, which also asks for $12.95/mo. These two best VPNs are also the most expensive VPNs we’ve yet reviewed.
Whilst Mozilla VPN sticks to an average of $9.99 per month, Mullvad VPN confines to $5.50 per month, winning the title of the most affordable VPN service of 2023. Well, the long-term subscription plans are a little confusing, the annual plan of $59.76 is still quite a bit less than the $67.73 average for the VPNs which saves you some money. But, we do not advise upgrading to long-term plans. Start with the shortest possible subscription and see if the VPN works for you.
If you feel too cold to swipe your card for the Surfshark VPN price model, numerous other VPNs are cheap, yet perform seriously well, then ProtonVPN is a great option. It is a free VPN that does not impose a data limit on its users.
While the monthly plan may punch hard on you, the British Virgin Islands-based VPN company offers excellent value for your money. The unlimited number of devices is a huge tick for one single subscription, a thing that most VPN companies don’t bother to even notice. Avira Phantom VPN, IPVanish, and Windscribe VPN are among the only VPNs that place no data limit on simultaneous connections.
What Do You Get for Your Money?
For $12.95 per month or $59.76 per year, you get Bypasser. This is the same as the split tunneling tool that lets you decide which apps and websites use the VPN connection. VPN Surfshark offers a multi-hop feature that creates a VPN connection to a server and then routes the traffic to a second VPN server for even greater security. But, this feature comes limited with a few server pairings. For example, you can connect to a USA-UK, France-USA, or Australia-USA server pairings.
For $12.95 per month, Surfshark download does not offer access to Tor via VPN, a feature that we find in NordVPN and ProtonVPN. Well, not a necessary feature, it’s just convenient to have a kind of push-button access. We see that other VPN companies offer extra-cost add-ons to your base subscription. NordVPN, for example, offers private, static IP addresses which is a handy feature when you find your VPN connection blocked. However, Surfshark does offer you its static servers for free, one caveat of using a static IP server for free is that it gets shared with everyone else using the same server.
Its privacy-focused features like custom DNS service and ad-blocker branded as CleanWeb is not a deal-breaker but they greatly help in streaming. Smart DNS changes the DNS address on your device from your local ones to Surfshark’s DNS servers based in the US. These DNS addresses will grant you access to US-based streaming services. Remember that it does not change your IP address but changes your DNS address.
Surfshark Alert got our most attention along with Surfshark search. Well, the former alerts you if your accounts have been compromised or your info leaked – much like HaveIBeenPwned and the latter is an ad-free privacy-respecting search tool that lets you search the web without being tracked. You are going to have to pay an additional $0.99 per month on top of your subscription to muscle up your privacy.
We love to boast about Surfshark One. This is a complete security suite and comes bundled with the core VPN product as well as antivirus, Surfshark Search, and Surfshark Alert. For $14.44 per month, we were not satisfied with its antivirus tool. Not many sources recommend using a VPN coupled with an antivirus because they perform poorly on detecting malicious sites, on-demand virus scanning, and real-time protection. So, $14.44 might seem generous at first, but it doesn’t have the credibility to stack it up at the moment.
The exciting things are happening behind closed doors. The Virgin Island-based VPN company has been working to connect all their existing VPN servers so that your traffic gets routed through a whole network of servers rather than a single VPN tunnel. This new technology obscures and hides your traffic, stabilizes performance, and enhances your VPN connection speed.
The first available Surfshark Nexus feature is the IP rotator. While a simple VPN connection provides you with a single IP address per session, with an IP rotator enabled, your IP address will be constantly changed without disconnecting you from a secured connection. Your ISP will be even less likely to track your online activity!
My all-time favorite feature is the Incogni. Once you choose Surfshark VPN download for Windows PC, Incogni will contact online data brokers for you, requiring them to remove all your info (like name, telephone number, and email address) from their databases. In this way, you’ll start to get fewer targeted ads, spam calls, and spam emails.
The software hides your real address, also called ‘camouflage mode’. It hides you from your internet provider such that it doesn’t keep any activity logs, such as your browsing history and DNS queries. It also uses the Advanced Encryption Standard to encrypt the data.
Similarly, a NoBorder mode helps you get online in countries where VPNs do not function or are commonly blocked. In other words, you can access VPN servers even with firewalls or restrictions involved. So, this feature tries to obfuscate your traffic in some way to help you get around the IP problems. You can use this technology to log on to the VPN in countries like China.
SurfsharkVPN download for PC has splashed out its features. Its ability to unblock streaming services like Netflix, iPlayer, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, and Disney+ is making it a powerful VPN provider and giving it a big improvement to its features. Beyond these basic features, Surfshark also spoofs your IP address and your physical GPS location.
Surfshark VPN Download: Performance & Protocols
We crown OpenVPN, as its open-source roots mean it has been picked over for potential vulnerabilities. The heir apparent to OpenVPN is WireGuard. Like OpenVPN, WireGuard is reportedly much faster than other protocols.
SurfsharkVPN download offers the OpenVPN protocol and WireGuard protocol in its Android, iOS, macOS, Linux, and Windows apps. The IKEv2 protocol is also available on Android, iOS, and macOS.
We used the Wireguard protocol during the testing phase, and it did slow the download and upload speed test results by some 60%. The uploading was not worse, but the download results need some of the dwindling.
So, to give you an idea and compare Surfshark with NordVPN or ProtonVPN, we’ll look at the speed test results. Surfshark VPN churned out an upload speed of 58%, and a download speed of 60%, and its latency is measured at around 60% compared with Nord’s 29% download speed, 25% upload speed, and 0% latency.
Surfshark VPN offers an AES-256-GCM encryption protocol that is an even more secure and updated version of the cipher. On Android, you get the Chacha20Poly1305 cipher which is again safer. I think it’s the speed that makes a difference. Some gadgets will enjoy better speeds with AES-256, while older phones will do better with Poly1305. Either way, the cryptographic libraries will protect you by all means.
The OpenVPN (TCP/UDP) protocol is perfect for bypassing government VPN restrictions. It is a little bulkier than WireGuard and IKEv2, but it is the only one that many routers natively support.
Surfshark Servers and Server Locations
You get a well above-average VPN server in 100 countries. HMA VPN has long boasted of having VPN servers in 190 countries, and PureVPN claims to have servers in 140 countries. Surfshark for Windows has six server locations in Africa and 12 in South America. Having a lot of server locations means you’re more likely to find one close to home. Hence, better speeds and connections.
From the list of servers available, you’ll find a few that are in China (Hong Kong), Turkey, and Vietnam – all of which have repressive internet policies. No servers in Russia, but you’ll likely connect to servers in Ukraine.
Surfshark VPN for PC has over 3,200 servers. Having these many servers is a good thing, but it doesn’t mean they are all better. CyberGhost still leads in this area, however, with more than 8,277 servers available.
Most VPNs offer all the same stuff, but SurfsharkVPN for Windows PCs has some rare features hidden in plain sight. For instance, RAM-only servers. These are servers that don’t store data by design. VPN services rent their services from data centers which means that their server count is high too. But, these servers can be less secure depending on the location of each.
They also hold private keys which could be stolen if hackers penetrate through them, making the technology vulnerable. Therefore, VPNSurfshark is one of the few VPN service providers that have transitioned to RAM-only servers. This way your data will wipe out so it can’t be recovered or tracked down.
Your Privacy With SurfsharkVPN – Is Surfshark VPN download for Windows legit?
In its policy documents, Surfshark VPN stresses it does not log IP addresses, browsing history, amount of bandwidth used, or network traffic. It does, however, log connection timestamps but deletes them 15 minutes after you’ve closed the connection.
Surfshark has undergone third-party audits to verify its statements about customer privacy and security. To assure this, Surfshark for PC has been independently audited twice by the leading security company Cure53. The first audit was performed in 2018, dealing with browser extensions as they are the least secure pieces of software. The tests went well and extensions were entitled secured.
The second audit was performed in 2021 by the same company. This time, they focused on the server infrastructure and general security, and the good thing – they passed the test with flying colors.
The audit is used to examine and evaluate the security posture exposed by the Surfshark server, VPN configuration, as well as the related infrastructure.
For a VPN service provider, transparency is a must to establish trust. To assure this, Surfshark download for Windows PC has been independently audited twice by the leading security company Cure53. The first audit was performed in 2018, dealing with browser extensions as they are the least secure pieces of software. The tests went well and extensions were entitled secured.
The second audit was performed in 2021 by the same company. This time, they focused on the server infrastructure and general security, and the good thing – they passed the test with flying colors. Finally, in January 2023, the company completed an audit by Deloitte that confirmed SurfsharkVPN download for Windows PC was complying with its stated policy to not keep user activity logs.
TunnelBear VPN, for instance, has committed to annual audits. We hope every other VPN as well as Surfshark to do such audits in the future. For example, we will be happy to see the results of new audits to ensure that the new infrastructural changes like Surfshark Nexus technology respect user privacy.
Surf Shark VPN Download for PC
Download Surfshark for Windows. The latest version for PCs works with Windows 11, Windows 10, Windows 8, and Windows 7. This is an offline installer setup file of Surfshark VPN and you can easily install it on your 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems. Surf Shark download for PC app is also available on Ubuntu and Devian systems. The company also offers an app for FireTV and FireStick. There are also proxy plug-ins for Chrome and Firefox and a custom DNS resolution for Xbox and PlayStation.
Hands-On With Surfshark VPN for Android
So, when we installed the VPN on Android, it looked very similar to the iOS version featuring a white interface when not connected to a VPN server. The app transitioned to a teal gradient when we connected to a VPN server. It hosts similar features including the CleanWeb and Whitelister including static servers and multi-hop connections.
We also tested the performance on Android. Running YouTube videos took some seconds for each video to play. The streaming is also good enough and takes less time to load. The quality is great and I did not notice any lag.
Is Surfshark a Good VPN?
There’s a lot to like about it. Surfshark VPN download for PC is best for its value along with improved security and faster connection. With the introduction of WireGuard, it has had a major overhaul of its security. It has a generous unlimited devices policy, letting you hook up as many devices as you like, and provides split tunneling and the rarely-seen multi-hop connection tool.
It’s also drifting and expanding with new products and services that are quite interesting and refreshing to see. The audit of Surfshark VPN infrastructure reassures the company’s privacy policies and we hope the company continues to perform these audits regularly. We think that it stands alongside its co-winners in this category: ExpressVPN, NordVPN, and Proton VPN.
Surfshark VPN vs Nord VPN: The Battle of Brands
Surfshark | Nord | |
| SmartDNS | ✅Yes | ✅Yes |
| Specialty servers | ✅Yes | ✅Yes |
| Split tunneling | ✅Yes | ✅Yes |
| Web filters | ✅Yes | ✅Yes |
| No logs policy | No logs | No logs |
| VPN protocols | WireGuard, OpenVPN, IKEv2 | OpenVPN, IKEv2/IPsec, WireGuard (NordLynx) |
| Simultaneous connections | Unlimited | 6 |
| Pricing | $12.95 per month | $11.99 per month |
| RAM servers | Yes | Yes |
| Servers | 3200+ | 5500+ |
| Virtual locations | Yes | No |
| DNS leak protection | Yes | Yes |
| Malware scanner | Yes | Yes |
| Encryption | AES-256-GCM and Chacha20Poly1305 | AES-256-GCM and ChaCha20 |
| Hash | SHA-512 | SHA-512 |
