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Best mobile VPN 2024

The best mobile VPN can boost your device's security and let you access services when you're travelling. Find the best VPN for your phone below.

Best Mobile VPN apps on an iPhone 12

The best mobile VPNs can help to keep your data private when you’re browsing online using your smartphone. The internet is great for providing entertainment and information, but it’s also a platform many criminals use to steal personal data from innocent people and commit fraud – the right VPN can help to protect you from this.

VPNs are also useful for protecting you from hackers in games such as PUBG Mobile, as well as helping you to gain access to the streaming services of your home region when you’re traveling abroad. Whatever you want your VPN to do, this list should help, we’ve tried and tested the best services. Our recommendations are broken down for your different needs, such as the best VPN for streaming and the best cheap VPN. We’ve tried and tested all of the best mobile VPNs to help you find the right choice, but if you want to tailor your results to the best iPhone or the best Android, check out our best iPhone VPN and best VPN for Android guide.

Why you can trust our advice ✔ At Pocket Tactics, our experts spend days testing games, phones, tech, and services. We always share honest opinions to help you buy the best. Find out how we test.

ExpressVPN

Best mobile VPN

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ExpressVPN specifications:
Server range 105+ countries
Compatible apps TikTok, Facebook, Tinder, Netflix, Roblox, Minecraft, Marvel Future Revolution, and more
Free trial No free trial
Money-back guarantee 30 days
Simultaneous connections 8
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 34.81ms
Average jitter 44ms
Reasons to buy
  • Servers span 94 countries
  • Refreshes servers IP addresses regularly
  • Uses the speedy Lightspeed protocol
Reasons to avoid
  • Expensive
  • No free trial

If you want a virtual private network that is both comprehensive and reliable, you should check out ExpressVPN. It has servers in more than 105 countries worldwide, providing you with substantial digital protection. It carries a slightly higher price tag than other providers, but it justifies that in multiple ways.

During our testing, we found that it had an average latency of 34.81ms, which is fine for online sessions in intense PC games – for using mobile games or streaming via mobile apps, you should face absolutely no problems. There are faster choices out there (such as NordVPN) but the vast majority of mobile users are likely to be satisfied with this performance.

We’re also impressed by the extent to which ExpressVPN has been enhanced and expanded over time. Even in just the last year or so, we’ve seen it add over ten new countries as connection points, and increase its cap on simultaneous connections from five to eight. The price has not changed significantly in that time either, so it’s a good sign that it is invested in keeping its customers satisfied.

Another benefit of ExpressVPN is the rate at which it refreshes the IP addresses of its servers. Some apps may block all VPN users by identifying the VPN’s IP addresses, but since ExpressVPN updates them so regularly, even if they do get blocked, they’ll get back in before too long.

Nonetheless, it’s not that likely to get blocked anyway. Of all providers, this is one of the VPNs that can access the vast majority of games and services without any issue. Considering the higher expense, we wish it offered a free trial that allowed users to get a feel for what it can offer, but at least it still has a 30-day money-back guarantee to fall back on.

Private Internet Access

Best cheap mobile VPN

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Private Internet Access specifications:
Server range 91+ countries
Compatible apps TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, Netflix, Roblox, Genshin Impact, Minecraft, Marvel Future Revolution, and more
Free trial No free trial
Money-back guarantee 30 days
Simultaneous connections Unlimited
Router support Yes
Reasons to buy
  • Cheap (with exclusive price for our readers)
  • Decent server selection
  • Unlimited connections
Reasons to avoid
  • One of the slower providers on this list
  • Based in the US (with less privacy-friendly laws)

Private Internet Access (PIA) has been on this list since we first wrote it a couple of years back – but it recently became even better. Where it once offered a generous cap of ten simultaneous connections, it has since upped the ante by allowing you to have as many connections as you want on a single account. This is great for anyone wanting to protect the privacy of their whole household or who just has lots of devices they want to use it on.

Admittedly, the average download speeds with PIA aren’t quite up to the standard you’d get with something like NordVPN or ExpressVPN, but considering the vast range of countries it gives you access to at such a low price, we’re reluctant to complain. It also has the biggest number of individual servers of any VPN we’ve ever seen, with over 35,000 of them. This isn’t a major benefit, but it eliminates the risk of server slowdown as a consequence of too many people using the same server at once.

It works well with most apps too, so you’re not likely to run into many (or any) compatibility issues. Those who are super privacy-focused may be reluctant to choose a VPN based in America due to its less privacy-friendly laws (Switzerland’s where it’s at), but it does at least submit itself to regular privacy audits so you know you can trust it with your data.

With a special low price for our readers (if you click through the links in this page), it’s a pretty fantastic bargain choice.

CyberGhost

Best VPN for streaming

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CyberGhost specifications:
Server range 100+ countries
Compatible apps FIFA Mobile, Minecraft, Roblox, Genshin Impact, Twitter, Facebook, Netflix, Disney Plus. and more
Free trial 24 hours
Money-back guarantee 45 days
Simultaneous connections 7
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 45.19
Average jitter 16
Reasons to buy
  • Compatible with most streaming platforms
  • 45-day money-back guarantee
Reasons to avoid
  • Limited simultaneous connections
  • A little slower than some other top providers

CyberGhost has been part of the VPN game for a very long time, providing you with protection that keeps you untraceable and anonymous online. With such a long list of servers available, and compatibility with all the major streaming platforms, this is one to go for if you like to watch a lot of TV and movies on your smartphone.

Unlike most VPNs, it actually offers a free trial, which gives you a bit of time to see how well it works with your favorite games and streaming apps. Annoyingly, the trial only lasts for a day, but it does make up for that a little with an extended 45-day money-back guarantee, so that’s a lot of time to test it (and cancel) if you find it doesn’t work smoothly with your favorite services.

It’s a little slower than ExpressVPN, so it’s not one of the absolute fastest out there, but it should be fine for streaming or playing most mobile games. Most people likely won’t notice any real difference compared to using those apps without the VPN on.

The biggest way that it falls behind other big providers like ExpressVPN or CyberGhost, is its limit of only seven simultaneous connections. Once upon a time, this was pretty generous, but with more providers not including any cap at all, this can feel quite restricting. If you’re planning on just using it yourself though, it’s not much of an issue, and altogether this is another reasonably priced provider with a great service to offer.

NordVPN

Fastest mobile VPN

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NordVPN specifications:
Server range 111+ countries
Compatible apps Netflix, Disney Plus, Hulu, TikTok, Roblox, Call of Duty: Mobile, Minecraft, Street Fighter: Duel, and more
Free trial No free trial
Money-back guarantee 30 days
Simultaneous connections 10
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 24.94ms
Average jitter 15ms
Reasons to buy
  • Incredible download speeds
  • Broad streaming service compatibility
Reasons to avoid
  • No free trial
  • Is slightly more expensive than others

Want a VPN that you can easily switch on with the press of a button and then not have to worry about your private data when on public Wi-Fi? NordVPN is a fantastic choice because, not only does it encrypt your data much more quickly than most VPNs thanks to the impressive NordLynx protocol, but it offers some pretty high download speeds too.

It’s another slightly more expensive choice, and like the others in that category, we wish that it gave customers a chance to test it out with a free trial (instead of forcing you to rely on its 30-day money-back guarantee), but take it from us that you are not likely to encounter any issues here. Aside from its fantastic performance, it is also compatible with just about everything, and with connection points in over 111 countries, it’s an expansive service.

Nord is also pretty great for offering users the ability to create a Meshnet LAN. What is this? Well, it’s a network that multiple devices around the world can connect to, meaning that you and your friends could all connect through it while playing online. Outside of that, if you have some sensitive files to send, if both ends are connected to the Meshnet, you know they’ve been sent and received discreetly.

It’s a provider you’ve probably heard of before, and its broad brand recognition comes from the fact that it has consistently offered a solid service for years. You can even see signs of continuous development even in just the last couple of years, with it almost doubling the number of countries you can connect through, and letting users have twice the amount of simultaneous connections. No doubt, the fantastic service it offers today will be even better in the near future.

Surfshark

Best mobile VPN for families

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Surfshark specifications:
Server range 100+ countries
Compatible apps TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, Pokémon Go, FIFA Mobile, Roblox, Minecraft, and more
Free trial One week
Money-back guarantee 30 days
Simultaneous connections Unlimited
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 32.44ms
Average jitter 31ms
Reasons to buy
  • Unlimited simultaneous connections
  • Week-long free trial
  • Cheaper solution
Reasons to avoid
  • Money-back guarantee has to be fought for
  • There are faster options

These days it’s becoming more and more common for VPNs to give users an unlimited number of simultaneous connections, but Surfshark deserves credit for having done this long before the rest of them. If you’re after a VPN that you and your large family can all have on your phones at the same time, this is a fantastic choice.

Surfshark is the only provider on this list to provide a substantial free trial too. While CyberGhost lets you use it for a day for free, Surfshark gives you a whole week, which should be more than enough time to test it thoroughly with all the different apps and services that you use regularly on your phone. However, we should also mention that you can only use this trial on mobile, which may be annoying for those who want to have a VPN on PC too.

If you’re a speed-fiend, there are faster options to choose from, but once again we should emphasize that this doesn’t really have an impact on ordinary day-to-day use.  Outside of that, it’s also a speedy one to get set up with, as it lets you connect via a Google account and therefore saves you from having to go through any long, complicated account creation processes.

Also, while it has a 30-day money-back guarantee like most of the others, it does try to wriggle out of the refund to some extent. If you ask for a refund, they are very agreeable but ask you to wait until the final day of the trial to make the most of the VPN while you can. On the surface that may seem helpful, but then if you forget on that day, or can’t get it sorted, you risk making it impossible to get the money back.

Still, for its price and its connection allowance, this is an appealing choice. If you’re a Pokémon Go fan, this is probably your best choice because unlike all the others we’ve tested, it has a built-in GPS spoofer which is essential for getting those regional exclusive Pokémon.

PrivadoVPN

Best free mobile VPN

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PrivadoVPN specifications:
Server range 46+ countries (paid), 8 countries (free)
Compatible apps Facebook, Netflix, Hulu, Twitter, Minecraft, FIFA Mobile, Genshin Impact, Call of Duty: Mobile, and more
Free trial Indefinite free plan with monthly 10GB allowance
Money-back guarantee 30 days
Simultaneous connections 10 (paid), 1 (free)
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 38.44ms
Average jitter 24ms
Reasons to buy
  • Offers a free plan
  • Can notify you if your private details are breached
  • Allows a decent number of simultaneous connections
Reasons to avoid
  • Paid plan slightly expensive
  • No router support available
  • Fewer servers in a small selection of locations

If you’re not planning to keep your VPN on all the time, and you just want it whenever you use public Wi-Fi, you may as well go for a free option. PrivadoVPN is fantastic because it gives you 10GB of data for you to use for free every single month.

Any differences in speed are negligible enough that you won’t notice any difference. You can easily use it for streaming movies on your phone, but you will of course have to be conscious of your data allowance, because if you run out in the middle of something, you may not be able to resume until the next time the data refreshes.

One thing to be very careful of is not using all the data up. If you never run over, it will refresh automatically after a month has passed. However, if you use it all up beforehand, you get stuck with a message telling you that you need to upgrade your plan even after the refresh date, which sucks.

On top of that, there’s also only a very small number of servers to choose from on the free plan (12), and that increases the risk of server congestion and of not being able to find a server that can access a specific game or app you want to use. But, what the heck, it’s free. You’ve got to expect a few small issues when you’re using a free VPN, and unlike a lot of the others out there, you’re not secretly paying with your data either.

PureVPN

Most private mobile VPN

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PureVPN specifications:
Server range 65+ countries
Compatible apps Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Netflix, Roblox, Minecraft, Call of Duty: Mobile, Genshin Impact, and more
Free trial $0.99 seven-day paid trial
Money-back guarantee 31 days
Simultaneous connections 10
Router support Yes
Average latency (ping) 51ms
Average jitter 8ms
Reasons to buy
  • Regular third-party privacy audits
  • Decent price
Reasons to avoid
  • Charges for its trial
  • Slightly buggy apps

It’s common for VPNs to have a no-logs policy, and if you don’t know what that means, it’s a promise from the provider that it won’t keep logs of your online activity. That’s great, but how much faith can you place in the promise of a business? Well, if you go for PureVPN, you can place all your faith in it, because it submits itself to regular unscheduled third-party audits.

There are a few little bugs in the app which can lead to it getting stuck, for example if you try and go to the ‘set up on other devices’ screen. On top of that, it also lacks the ability to activate split-tunneling on mobile devices, but if you just want to choose a server and turn it on, you shouldn’t encounter any troubles.

Still, with connection points in almost 70 countries, it’s got an impressive selection for its users. On top of that, it lets you use it on ten devices simultaneously, so even if you have a household of ten people who all want a VPN on their phones, you’ll all be covered.

We also quite like that it has different servers that are optimized for different types of use (e.g. gaming or streaming), which makes it a lot easier to find an appropriate server whenever you’re trying to do something. It’s still slower than the big ones, but we appreciate the extra level of optimization and compatibility.

How to choose the best mobile VPN

Choosing the right mobile VPN can be a daunting task, as there are so many solutions to choose from. Think carefully about what you’re going to use the VPN for, and then consider what you’ll need a provider to offer in order to accommodate your needs.

For example, are you hoping to access international streaming libraries on your phone? In that case, check whether the VPN is compatible with your platform of choice. If it’s not listed on the VPN’s official website, you can probably find the details of users’ different experiences with a quick Google search.

If there’s content from a specific region that you need to access, then you should check a VPN’s list of connection points. Any VPN worth using will give you a complete list of countries it has servers in, so checking this shouldn’t be an issue.

If budget limitations are a key factor for you, there are several things to be conscious of. While many VPNs do indeed offer limited-time offers and promotions to make their service a more appealing choice, it is also very common for VPNs to simply put on the appearance of having an offer by listing the regular price, calling it a special deal and adding a timer to give the illusion that the price will go up soon.

This is simply a marketing tactic used to create pressure and make people impulse buy a VPN. If you see something like this, the chances are that you can completely ignore it, safe in the knowledge that the same price will still be available after a few days’ consideration.

You should also be wary of those offering a free VPN, as it’s often misleading. ExpressVPN describes itself as having a free VPN service when in reality it’s referring to its 30-day money-back guarantee, which is completely different because you have to pay initially, and it’s only “free” in the sense that you can ask for that money back at any point within 30 days.

If you are especially privacy-conscious, you should also look out for a no-logs policy first and foremost. This is a guarantee that the service provider is not storing data about your activities while the VPN is on. If the word of a business alone is not enough, you can also look out for those who have undergone independent privacy audits.

These audits are often carried out without warning and mean that the VPNs don’t have any time to “put on a show” and present themselves as being more private than they are. The third-party auditors have no agenda other than to make sure customer privacy is being respected and will give tips to the VPN providers for ways that they could improve if there are any issues (or weaknesses to new technology/software). These are a very strong indication that you can trust a VPN.

Outside of that, you might also want to look at the country in which a VPN is located. Every country has different rules about privacy and a VPN provider cannot give you more privacy than is legally permitted in its region. Switzerland is a pretty great country for respecting privacy, so that’s one to look out for, but besides that, if you’re concerned about this to such a high degree, we recommend doing your own research on any given VPN’s home region.

Last, but certainly not least, if you plan to use your VPN for anything especially data-intensive (e.g. streaming an online game via Game Pass on your phone), we recommend looking into a VPN’s average speeds. This kind of data can be hard to find, but we’ve included the results of our own research and testing here in this list.

Still got questions? Check out the FAQs below:

Is it safe to use a VPN on your mobile?

Absolutely. Considering that it stops your private data from being accumulated by huge organizations that will then use it to manipulate you via social media algorithms, it’s arguably safer to use a VPN on mobile than to not. Be careful that you’re not using an obscure, dodgy brand though, as those could potentially be unsafe.

Is mobile banking safe with a VPN?

Yes, it is, though we recommend connecting via a VPN server in your home region. If you are using a server on the other side of the world, the bank might reasonably conclude that a stranger is trying to access your account and lock it down for your own safety.

Should I run my VPN all the time?

There’s no definitive right answer here as it depends on what you’re doing online. If you are connected via a server in another country, you’ll get Google results tailored for people in that region, and find that online stores may be showing a different currency.

You may chose to turn your VPN off selectively whenever you’re trying to do something you don’t want the VPN interfering with (e.g. shopping, banking, finding local recommendations)  or, alternatively, only switch the VPN on when you specifically need it (e.g. when making especially sensitive Google searches, trying to access another country’s streaming libraries, or using public Wi-Fi). Free VPNs with data caps lend themselves well to the second approach.

Do VPNs drain your battery faster?

Yes, but only to a minuscule extent. While we can’t speak for every VPN ever made, this is true of all the major, trustworthy ones.

Can I be tracked with a VPN on?

To some extent, yes. A VPN is one slice of the privacy pie, and while it is a very large slice, there are other ways that you might still be tracked while using it. For example, if you are checking in at locations on social media outside parties can access this information even if your account is private. Likewise, if you are using a credit or debit card, it will be possible to track where you have been. Though at this point, we’re really getting into the weeds of how the police track criminals, and we’re certainly not advocating VPN use for those seeking to evade justice for their crimes (and many VPNs cooperate with law enforcement officials if it is believed that customers have been using a VPN to cover the tracks of their crimes).

Looking to find out which VPNs work well with specific games? We have lists on the best Roblox VPN and the best Pokémon Go VPN for you to check out as well.