Windscribe Review: Is the Popular VPN Any Good?

If you’re unsure whether you should choose this provider, this Windscribe review will come in handy. This provider garnered ample popularity with its fast and reliable free VPN. However, its premium plan delivers even more thanks to uncapped bandwidth and speed. Today’s in-depth review of Windscribe will focus on the latter.

Our team has tested Windscribe in its best, premium form, and we have some interesting discoveries to divulge. We must say the provider has seen a share of improvements recently. It’s safe, secure, and well-equipped with capable servers, which wasn’t the case a few years ago.

This provider is far from perfect, though, and our team was diligent enough to spot its shortcomings as well. Let’s go through both in this expert review of Windscribe VPN for 2026.

Windscribe VPN Pros & Cons

We’ll make our in-depth review of Windscribe more digestible for you if you’re too lazy to read everything. Here are the advantages and shortcomings of this provider, based on the review of its premium version:

Windscribe Pricing: How Much Does It Cost?

Starting this review with the price analysis is a good way to see if the provider is affordable. Windscribe’s pricing structure is simple and it offers 3 plans.

The monthly plan at $9 is a lot cheaper than the average monthly plan which usually goes over $12.

There’s the annual plan with this “Cool Badge” for some reason, that costs $5.75 a month or $69 every 12 months. We think this price isn’t too expensive but also not very affordable. We recently tested NordVPN, which costs around $5 a month (even less with a 2-year plan), while the Plus plan is $5.99 per month.

Beware that NordVPN is a lot better while costing less. Keep that in the back of your mind. However, Windscribe has a pretty awesome Build-A-Plan variant. This plan costs as low as $3 a month and lets you build a bespoke VPN deal with the servers you need.

Each server is $1 a month and you can pick from either 40 GB of monthly data or unlimited data + R.O.B.E.R.T (more about this feature later in the review). We picked the latter, along with a few Windflix (servers for Netflix) servers one time, and the plan worked like a charm!

In our Windscribe test, we discovered that the provider offers static IP addresses. Users can pick residential or data center IPs that cost $8 and $2 a month respectively. The downside is that you don’t get many locations – only 3 for residential (US/CA) and 10 for data center static IP addresses (US/NL/Germany/UK/France/CA/Switzerland).

Money-Back Guarantee and Free Trial

We all know that Windscribe offers a free plan. It’s simple to set up and use. Better yet, this plan offers access to many features you’ll find in the premium version. Unfortunately, it’s limited to a few server locations with the exclusion of Windflix servers for streaming.

Above all, this plan is limited to 10 GB of monthly bandwidth, which will hardly be sufficient for anyone. Windscribe did a logical thing when it decided not to provide free trials.

Its free plan is a free trial – right? When it comes to the refund policy, it’s not unconditional.

For example, NordVPN’s 30-day refund policy is a money-back guarantee, which means you will get a refund if you request it in 30 days. Here, the condition is that you request it in up to 7 days and do NOT spend more than 10 GB of bandwidth.

Payment Methods

Windscribe doesn’t let you swim in payment methods but you get enough of them. They include:

• Credit cards
• PayPal
• Cryptocurrencies
• Local payments

Crypto payments are processed by CoinPayments and you can use any coin you like, which we loved in our Windscribe review. Apart from BTC and DASH, users can pay with XMR, QTUM, PIVX, ETH, SOL, and plenty more. All payments are refundable as well.

Ease of Use & Compatibility

We praised the ease of use of ExpressVPN in our review but can’t say the same about Windscribe.

This provider offers a minimal app on Windows and macOS whose window is so small, it’s sometimes barely readable. While it looks nice, it can be irritating. When you open the server list, it extends below, taking up way more space on the screen than it should.

We also discovered that it can be quite slow to connect and a bit clunky at times. To open Settings, you use the three horizontal dots and work your way to the settings you like. Each option has a description, which, again, is sometimes unreadable – such a shame.

Windscribe’s apps are way better on iOS and Android, and in our experience, they’re snappier and more reliable overall. Speaking of devices, we’ll switch our mood from anger to happiness. This VPN works on all systems and offers mostly native apps. It works on:

• Windows, macOS, and Linux (Arch, Fedora, CentOS, Debian, Ubuntu) computers
• Android and iOS phones and tablets
• Fire TV and Android TV
• Routers
• Browsers (browser extensions for Chrome, Brave, Firefox, and Edge)

The VPN’s browser extensions aren’t the best, as they act as proxies instead of full-fledged VPNs. You’ll find a better Chrome VPN addon in NordVPN or ExpressVPN. We’ve left the best for the last. Windscribe offers unlimited simultaneous connections to its premium users.

This means you can effectively protect all devices and even share the subscription with others to squeeze the most juice out of this provider.

Security Features of Windscribe: Is It Safe to Use?

If you’ve come to this review to find out if Windscribe is safe, we’ll break it to you now – it is.

However, we still think we should sift through its features together and see what its premium plan offers. We have plenty of ground to cover, so stay put.

Basic VPN Features

Like most VPNs, Windscribe has a share of basic and so-called “mandatory” features you’ll find in reliable providers. We tested them all, so here’s a rundown:

• AES-256 encryption. Okay, so we know this is the best encryption worldwide. Strong, formidable, and unbreakable, it’s ideal to preserve your privacy and prevent your ISP and data brokers from tracking you.
• Firewall Mode. It’s Windscribe’s name for a kill switch. It will shut down your internet connection if the VPN connection breaks to prevent IP leaks. You can also manually control it to work after or before the connection for added customization.
• Split Tunneling. It excludes or includes apps and domains from using the VPN tunnel. Unlike CyberGhost which offers only Domain Split Tunneling, here, as you can learn now, you get both. That’s a handy addition.
• Modern Protocols. Windscribe offers OpenVPN, WireGuard, and IKEv2 protocols. However, you also get Stealth and WStunnel options for bypassing censorship and boosting privacy in censorship-laden regions.
• RAM-Only Servers. Lastly, the provider bases all of its servers on Random Access Memory (RAM). This feature is found in some of the best premium providers and ensures no information lingers on the server because it’s wiped clean with each server restart. This ideally complements a no-logging policy that Windscribe nourishes.

Advanced Security Features

When it comes to advanced features we discovered in our Windscribe test, we’ll discuss them more thoroughly and see how they work.

Double Hop Connections

Windscribe offers a so-called Double Hop function but you won’t find it in the app. It works kinda… silly. Instead of offering a Double VPN like NordVPN, where you just connect to a “location pair”, you have to do it manually.

For reasons you’ll soon see, Double Hop won’t work on iOS and Android but only on desktop platforms.

You’ll first need to install the browser extension – you see where this is going. Then, you need to connect to a VPN server in your app and alter your IP address through the VPN extension in Chrome, Brave, or any other browser. And this should be your Double Hop.

Since iOS and Android don’t support browser extensions, here’s your answer as to why Double Hop won’t work. We tested this feature and it’s pretty good for overall security but again, we expected a more streamlined approach and not manual labor to get it to work.

R.O.B.E.R.T

We’ll call it ROBERT because it’s easier. This is one of our favorite features of this provider. In our Windscribe test, we used it to block ads, trackers, malware, and other annoyances. However, after testing it further, we found out its many functions beyond these.

For example, ROBERT can block social networks, porn sites, gambling platforms, crypto services, and even clickbait websites. If you’re feeling rebellious and don’t want to use another VPN, there’s the option to block them, which, surprisingly or not, works as intended and really prevents access and connections to other VPNs.

ROBERT is fully customizable as well. You can set custom rules and block only specific domains. This is great if you have children and want to make the internet a safe place for them. You can, with a few clicks, block all inappropriate content with Windscribe.

We saw a similar feature in ExpressVPN. Parental Control, to be precise. However, we think Windscribe expanded upon it even more to offer something astounding. Bear in mind that ROBERT works in the free plan as well, so it’s not locked behind the paywall.

Secure Hotspot

While you can set up this VPN on a router, you might not need to. We found its Secure Hotspot pretty handy for sharing our VPN connection wirelessly. Once enabled, you’ll need to provide the SSID and password required to connect to a VPN. Other users can take advantage of this secure VPN connection without Windscribe installed.

It’s like a mobile hotspot on your iPhone or Android phone and we think it’s awesome. You can use this in many ways. We often did it on our Smart TV we would connect to Windscribe and watch Netflix or unblock some restricted sites along the way. Nice stuff but works only on Windows, so it’s a bit of a bummer.

Advanced Tweaks

This tiny app offers a wealth of customization options – more than you’d expect. There’s the Advanced Parameters tab where you can tweak the app to your liking. You’ll, however, need a bit of coding to make do. Windscribe lets you customize and personalize many things.

We often switched from different DNS providers like Cloudflare, OpenDNS, and others directly from the app. Another interesting tweak is the option to determine the packet size manually by inputting the number you want. Proxy Gateway is also worth mentioning.

It’s Windscribe’s proxy server that you can use on your gaming console, Smart TV, or other proxy-friendly devices. Simply select the proxy type from HTTP or SOCKS, paste the address into the proxy settings on another device, and you’re good to roll.

IP and DNS Leak Test

You don’t need this comprehensive review of Windscribe to guess it’s a leak-free VPN. Still, let us reassure you it works well and keeps your privacy intact.

We used a random US server for this test but outside of this review, we tested almost all of its available countries.

As you can see, using an American VPN server yields phenomenal results. Our location at the time was Belgrade, but no Serbian IP address leaked in the tests. We used the website ipleak.net for this test, which is popular and very accurate in displaying IP and DNS leaks.

Another website we used was browserleaks.com – a good one, mind you. After trying out Windscribe VPN and putting it to the test, we found no issues. All IP and DNS addresses displayed on both sites were from the United States – nowhere near Serbia!

Does Windscribe Keep Logs?

This review is incomplete without the “logging or not” part. Windscribe is a famous Canadian VPN company known for incredible transparency. For instance, all of its apps are open-source so everyone can access their source codes and improve them.

Another thing we appreciate is its talkative nature. It has an entire Reddit section where it’s constantly in touch with its users to implement more features and improve the service. Generally speaking, Windscribe’s history is favorable, and never saw the provider logging.

This can easily be checked online as well. One thing we don’t like is the Canadian jurisdiction, which is at the forefront of the 5 Eyes. However, this isn’t such a problem nowadays because many VPNs from the USA (also 5 Eyes) are safe – Private Internet Access is a good example.

It’s worth noting Windscribe’s 2021 security breach that affected the VPN seriously. Windscribe’s Ukrainian VPN servers were unencrypted, letting this country’s authorities obtain the company’s private key that would allow them to decrypt all data on this VPN’s users. How did the company respond? Well, it just admitted to being wrong.

Luckily, the provider made changes to its product and made it far safer now, mainly with RAM-only servers and Perfect Forward Secrecy.

Windscribe’s Privacy Policy Review

If we check its privacy policy, we’ll first see it’s short – thank God! Everything is explained splendidly, as Windscribe openly claims to not store your IP address, VPN session info, and visited websites. This, mind you, also applies to its free plan, which is nice to know.

Some information must be stored but the data that Windscribe uses is benign. For instance, it knows about your used bandwidth in 30 days, likely to enforce its 10 GB allowance for free users. There’s also a timestamp of your last activity in Windscribe, which, again, sounds benign, and couldn’t be used to compromise your privacy.

Windscribe holds some data during the connection’s duration. While connected to a server, the OpenVPN/IKEv2 username, time of connection, and transferred data are in the server’s memory. Once you disconnect, all data is wiped clean.

Third-Party Audits

Windscribe doesn’t have an audit on its no-log policy yet, which brings about some concerns. Compared to NordVPN, which has multiple audits from security firms, we surely have more reason to believe that VPN instead of Windscribe. The latter has transparency reports, that, while nice, aren’t as trust-inducing as rock-solid audits.

Yes, you’ll say that Windscribe’s desktop app has been audited and is open-source. But we’d still like to see how its no-log policy would fare in a comprehensive analysis, especially after the security breach that affected Windscribe big time.

Windscribe VPN Server Location Analysis

This provider offers what many consider more than enough server locations. Visiting its website and clicking on “Features” immediately lets you discover its “large network”, as Windscribe says. It offers servers in 69 countries and 134 cities. These numbers sound okay considering many premium VPNs tend to offer under 50 or 60 countries.

However, pinning it against NordVPN with 111 countries, or ExpressVPN with 105, doesn’t do it justice. NordVPN and ExpressVPN are way better, we’ve already said that, so the comparison isn’t fair. If we evaluate Windscribe alone, we can see some great things.

For example, it uses RAM-only 10 Gbps servers. Another thing people will value is the lack of virtual locations. This means the provider uses strictly physical servers in 134 cities, which is commendable because it requires a lot more investments. What about dedicated servers?

Glad you asked. We mentioned in this Windscribe review its static IP address. They’re paid additionally, whereas, Surfshark offers them in every plan – a big difference. The app also sports these “Windflix” servers optimized for Netflix. We’ll see how they work in a minute.

Overall, the server park is sufficient for the most part. It offers ample servers in the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, Europe, and other popular locations.

Speed Tests: Windscribe’s Performance Evaluation

This provider isn’t known as a hasty VPN with great speeds. That title belongs to NordVPN. This, however, doesn’t mean it’s slow – or does it? Let’s find that out in our speed tests. The first parameter we’ll go with is our native internet speed.

Here are the results:

We were in Europe at the time of testing Windscribe, which is important to mention because of our testing procedure. We tested Windscribe 3 times a day, 3 days in a row, using 3 server locations – the UK, the USA, and Japan. In terms of used protocol, we didn’t touch anything and let the provider decide what’s best.

The results you see below are the best we could achieve during our tests. Let’s examine these Windscribe speed tests and see what’s up.

UK Speed Test Results:

US Speed Test Results:

Japan Speed Test Results:

We can see that the provider performs fairly well. It’s indeed not the fastest. Bear in mind our native speed was already way above average so a 50% reduction or larger isn’t very alarming. If you have a native speed of, let’s say 50 Mbps… well, that’s another situation.

In this case, Windscribe will surely influence your connection speed, and you’ll notice a stark difference. After all, this provider isn’t a champion performance-wise, making NordVPN’s performance far more attractive. Try NordVPN’s free trial by following this simple guide.

Streaming & Torrenting With Windscribe

We all know most people care about online entertainment and streaming happens to be quite popular. In our Windscribe review for 2026, we highlighted its Windflix servers. We promised to explain how well they work.

Well, here’s the answer – phenomenally! Windflix servers are in a few countries, including:

• Canada
• Japan
• United Kingdom
• United States

All four locations work with Netflix, which is a pleasant surprise. It’s worth mentioning that other locations show mixed results, making Windscribe viable only for roughly four to five catalogs. That’s way less than NordVPN’s 20+ accessible libraries. Other streaming services will work just fine, including BBC iPlayer, MAX, Prime Video, and ESPN.

When it comes to torrenting, the provider holds no punches. You can use any server, open the torrent client, and start downloading. This provider offers no dedicated P2P servers. It instead offers the opposite – a warning if a specific VPN location frowns upon P2P file sharing. You’ll see a small icon that signifies that.

The general experience with Windscribe for streaming and torrenting is pleasant but surely not otherworldly. If you’ve already bought this VPN, we reckon you won’t be gravely disappointed, except if you want access to more Netflix libraries. You have NordVPN for that.

Using Windscribe for Bypassing Censorship: Is It Efficient?

Bypassing censorship with Windscribe is a complex topic. We tested the provider in China and it barely worked for us, with a few exceptions here and there. After checking with other users on Reddit, we found they have ample problems in China and interestingly – Russia.

For some reason, Windscribe stopped working a few months ago at the time of writing the review. Apparently, the provider is working on fixing the problem but currently, to no avail. Our team’s experience was subpar, even when using WStunnel and Stealth VPN.

The latter should mask your VPN traffic and let you get over the Great Firewall. Theory is one thing and practice is another. We recently made a list of the best VPNs that work in China. Our team debated whether or not to include Windscribe due to its volatile nature.

However, our tests showed that it wasn’t reliable enough, not earning its place on the list. If you want a provider that would work at least 9 out of 10 times, you can pick NordVPN and enable its obfuscated servers. ExpressVPN is also stellar, with built-in obfuscation.

Tight-budget users should consider Surfshark and its NoBorders mode. Our tests showed that all three surpass Windscribe in China, Russia, Turkey, and the UAE.

Customer Support

You won’t get the best customer support from this provider. On-site support comes in the form of Garry – a tryhard human whose true nature stinks of a chatbot. You’ll open the “live chat” widget, type in the question, and Garry will tackle it like a champ. Unfortunately, there’s no human support, at least not in the form of live chat.

You’ll have to go to the Support tab and sift through Windscribe’s FAQs and tutorials. If not, you can seek help on Reddit or Discord where Windscribe’s developers are active and ready to help you. The level of support isn’t the highest but we’ll be honest – the support team tries its best to help its users.

We would love to see live chat support for a more “direct” approach. That would elevate the experience and make the provider feel more professional.

Conclusion

After trying out and testing this provider thoroughly, we must give this Windscribe review a proper send-off. We think this provider managed to stay afloat for good reasons. It’s secure, doesn’t keep logs, offers unlimited simultaneous connections, and is suitable for streaming and P2P.

It’s also one of the rare premium VPNs with a free version.

This makes the service much more approachable for people testing the field and thinking about which provider to choose. However, we should also review its flaws, such as a major security breach in 2021, not the largest server park, average performance, and “okay” streaming abilities.

Its annual price is far from the cheapest and if you want a better VPN at a similar price, we’d say NordVPN is the best buy, especially with its 2-year plan at just over $3/mo. Cheaper, yet better providers also include PIA and Surfshark, both with unlimited connections.

We won’t say Windscribe is bad. You’ll likely be satisfied but with the few presented superior options, Windscribe wouldn’t be our go-to choice in 2026.