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AirVPN is a technical, privacy-first VPN designed for advanced users and power users who favour complete control over their configuration, open-source apps, and robust security tools over user-friendly simplicity.
While its strict no-logs policy and flexible protocol options make it a good pick for privacy advocates, its steep learning curve, outdated interface, limited server footprint, and underwhelming performance make it a poor fit for mainstream users.
Pricing and plans
AirVPN offers a single pricing tier, but unlike other VPNs, there’s lots of flexibility within that.
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Prices range from 2 Euros for a 3-day subscription to 99 Euros for a 3-year subscription. Prices are in Euros regardless of where you are in the world, so factor in currency conversion rates before you sign up.
The company offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can pay using card, PayPal, Crypto, Google Play, or a gift voucher. You don’t even need to provide an email address when you sign up.
There are no add-ons and no additional features like antivirus or cloud storage. This is purely a VPN service, which clearly states that it’s only for securing your internet connection, not your PC, and that you should purchase a different product for that.
This lack of features is reflected in its very low price, but if you are looking for additional security features, there are better VPNs offering a suite of additional tools such as NordVPN, Surfshark or Proton VPN.
Server network
AirVPN is based in Italy, and has one of the smallest server networks of any VPN we review with only 40 server locations in 23 countries.
By comparison, NordVPN has over 200 locations in 118 countries to pick from, and Surfshark has just over 140 locations in 100 countries. Interestingly, AirVPN no longer offers its service in its home country, ensuring it wouldn’t have to comply with an Italian law that forced VPN providers to block certain websites.
Privacy
For a company so focused on user privacy, it’s disappointing that AirVPN doesn’t go into a great deal of detail about its no-logs policy.
There’s a single entry in the FAQs asking “Do you keep session logs or any other kind of logs that can be used to track identity and Net activity?” and a one-line response stating, “No, we don’t keep logs of that kind.”
Further detail can be found in the company’s Privacy Policy, which states, “Activity traffic and/or traffic content and/or IP addresses of the customers or users are not inspected, logged or stored into any mass storage device.”
This is reassuring and backed up by a RAM-only server infrastructure, meaning that all data is lost the moment the server is turned off.
However, a third-party audit would solidify the company’s no-log claims. No audit has been carried out to date, while other VPN providers like Proton VPN have been audited five times or more.
We’ve got no complaints about the technology, either. AirVPN uses AES-256-GCM encryption, 4096-bit RSA keys, HMAC SHA384 on the control channel, with the OpenVPN protocol supplemented by OpenVPN over SSH, SSL, or Tor to help you get online in VPN-blocking countries.
Apps, features & usability
AirVPN uses an open-source app called Eddie, which is available for Windows, macOS, Android, and Linux. There’s no app for iOS users but you can still use AirVPN if you’re willing to manually set up the OpenVPN and WireGuard connections yourself.
The Eddie app on both desktop and mobile could charitably be described as dated, with an interface that looks like it’s come straight from Windows Vista.
It does provide a lot of useful information, such as a stats page that shows a staggering amount of detail about your VPN connection. This includes the name of the server you’re connected to, the server location, latency, load, number of users, session start time, upload and download speed, data uploaded and downloaded, incoming IP address, outgoing IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, protocol, port, the encryption you’re using, and more.
It’s great for power users, letting them pick and choose the best server for any given day, but the average VPN user might find the sheer amount of information overwhelming.
There’s no split-tunneling, but there are obfuscated connections, GPS spoofing, custom DNS servers, and a sort of multi-hop connection which requires you to manually connect to an AirVPN location through a proxy or Tor server first.
Some web filtering is available to block sites like gambling, malware, porn, etc., but the filters are updated quite slowly.
There’s also support for torrenting and port forwarding, and once you claim a port, it’s yours for as long as you have an AirVPN account. There are no specific P2P servers, you can torrent from any location.
To connect to something besides Eddie’s location choice, we had to browse a lengthy list of individual servers. That’s not so convenient, although Eddie does score for detail, displaying server location, latency, load, connected users, and more.
With most apps, you could get around this by adding servers to a Favorites list. AirVPN’s alternative enables adding servers to a blocklist (where they’ll never be displayed), or an allow list (the only servers you’ll ever want to use).
It’s more configurable, but also more complicated, and requires some thought to set it up.
It’s a similar story when you’re connected. Most apps display, at most, your current VPN server location and IP address. Eddie’s Stats page also shows the server location, load, number of current users, protocol, port, encryption algorithm, session start time and length, IPv6 exit address, data uploaded and downloaded, and plenty more.
This can all look a little intimidating, especially for VPN newbies. But you won’t see this information unless you go looking (it’s tucked away on the Stats page), and experts may find it useful.
AirVPN’s Android and Mac apps are much the same as the Windows edition: you can get connected in a couple of taps, but there’s also way more status information and configurability than you’ll see anywhere else.
When we connected to a VPN server with the Android app, for instance, it displayed 25 separate details about our connection: server name, IP and port; local and gateway IPv4 and IPv6 addresses; encryption, hash function, tunnel name and so much more.
It looks like overkill to us – most people won’t need to know 75% of this, and even if AirVPN thinks this data is necessary, there’s no reason it couldn’t be hidden away in a Status tab.
The Android app works a little better in other areas. Unlike Windows, for instance, it doesn’t have separate pages for country and server lists – you can expand a country to choose a particular city all within the same page.
There aren’t as many settings on Android as Windows. That’s not a major criticism, though – there are still more than most people will ever need. The app tries a little harder to help you out, too, with more text captions to try and explain what any given option does.
But AirVPN still assumes a lot of knowledge, and chances are you won’t have any idea what most of these settings do. (What are the consequences of setting Compression to ‘Enable’, ‘Disable’ or ‘Downlink Only’, for instance?)
The Mac app is more like the Windows version, and has much the same advantages and disadvantages. There’s a huge amount of configurability available if you need it, but to make the most of this, you’ll need lots of networking expertise, or plenty of time to play around and learn how everything works.
Settings
If you thought the main Eddie UI was complex, just wait until you see the settings, where AirVPN provides more fine-tuned, comprehensive control over operations than any other VPN app we’ve ever seen. By far.
Take the Protocols pane, for instance. Eddie only supports OpenVPN, so the most we normally see is a UDP/TCP option and maybe a ‘Port’ box. Eddie has a list of no less than 60 options for various combinations of protocols and ports, including UDP, TCP, and (unusually) SSL or SSH to bypass VPN blocks, along with text descriptions of when to use each one (‘if your ISP applies caps or blocks’).
Then there’s the kill switch (a system to block internet access if the VPN drops). Most apps have, at most, a checkbox to turn it on and off. AirVPN gives you options to block or allow incoming or outgoing traffic separately; there are settings to allow local network traffic, pings or DNS queries; you can add custom IP addresses that won’t be affected by the block; and you can even choose how the kill switch will work (by using the Windows Filtering Platform, or the Windows firewall).
Elsewhere, there are options to configure proxy and Tor support, Windows routes, custom DNS servers, the network layers you’d like to pass through the VPN tunnel (you could alternatively block IPv6 traffic or send it outside the tunnel, for instance), add extra OpenVPN directives, even run specified commands at particular program events (launch an app when you’re connected, perhaps, or close it when a session ends).
There are some omissions, though. Eddie is great at configuring how a connection works, but doesn’t give you as much control over how a connection is made. There’s no ‘auto-connect when I join an untrusted network’, for instance.
If the lengthy feature list sounds intimidating, that’s because it is: even if you’re a VPN expert, it can be difficult to figure out what particular options do and how to get the results you need.
Don’t rule out AirVPN solely because of this complexity, though. Keep in mind that the app normally works well all on its own, and you’ll never even see the settings unless you intentionally go looking. But if you’re hankering for power or configurability, even only very occasionally, the app is well worth a look.
Speed performance and streaming unblocking
Despite its small server network, AirVPN returned decent WireGuard speeds during testing, with download speeds between 957 and 1232Mbps depending on which server we connected to.
OpenVPN was another story, with speeds lagging at barely 200Mbps, which is concerning given that a lot of AirVPN’s customization options are to be found when using OpenVPN.
These results put AirVPN in the middle of the pack for speed, propped up somewhat by its budget price and single-minded focus on privacy.
The speeds are fast enough for streaming UHD and 4K content, though it struggled to access any streaming platform other than Netflix, so there are better choices out there if this is a big part of why you need a VPN.
The limited number of locations also means limited access to regional services as well. There are no servers located in Australia, for instance, so none of the Australian services work with AirVPN.
It’s a better story for torrenting, with P2P supported on all AirVPN’s servers; there are no streaming/torrenting-specific ones, though slow download speeds mean any downloads over OpenVPN will be far slower than competitors like IPVanish or Proton VPN.
Support, accessibility, and reviews
Support for AirVPN comes via the company website and forum page. You can also email support, post in the AirVPN subreddit, or submit a ticket through the AirVPN website.
The website has an FAQ, but it’s got very little information on it, and many of the entries are very short.
A search engine lets you search the website for help, but it mostly returns results from the forum. Support for the Eddie VPN app can be found on the Eddie website instead of AirVPN.
The Eddie app also barely offers keyboard support. You can navigate to connect, but there’s no way to disconnect, and on many screens keypresses do nothing at all.
Reviews for the company are mixed, with a 3.2 on Google Play, but there are more positive reviews than negative ones, though the basic nature of the service is a frequent criticism.
AirVPN review: Final verdict
AirVPN is a niche offering intended for people comfortable working with highly technical products, and it’s not one we would recommend for the average internet user.
If you’re after a privacy-first VPN, there are other, more accessible options, such as Proton VPN or Mullvad. Both providers have been audited multiple times, so you can trust that their privacy claims are sincere.
