hide.me VPN

Offering a popular free version and cheap premium plans, hide.me claims to be one of the best value VPNs in the world. But will the free version keep you safe online, and how do its paid plans stack up to other premium VPNs?

To find out, I performed extensive tests on every feature that hide.me offers. I explored speeds, streaming capabilities, and safety with the free and paid versions. In addition, I found out everything there is to know about its privacy policies.

After my tests, I recommend hide.me if you want a safe, privacy-friendly premium VPN for a low price. The free version is nice, but it has slow speeds, a limited network, and won’t let you access some essential features. However, you can try all premium features risk-free using its 30-money-back guarantee. I tested it and received a no-questions-asked refund.

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Streaming — High-Quality With Streaming-Optimized Servers

hide.me’s specialty streaming servers worked with multiple platforms. Videos loaded almost instantly using nearby servers, and playback was consistently excellent. Standard servers also worked with some platforms, but I’d recommend sticking with the optimized ones for the best quality.

My colleagues and I could watch a handful of platforms on the free option, but slow loading times were very frustrating. This wasn’t a surprise since hide.me had already informed us that its free version doesn’t support streaming.

A global distribution of reliable servers means you can safely access and watch content from anywhere.

With the premium version, we could safely watch the streaming platforms in the table below:

Works With: Netflix

During our tests, we could safely stream the complete Netflix libraries for US, UK, Japan, Canada, and more using optimized servers. We had zero playback issues while watching Netflix, even when we skipped around.

Note that with hide.me’s global server network, it’s possible to change Netflix regions from anywhere.

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However, my teammate in the US reported that the non-optimized Dallas server only worked with Netflix Originals — a version that features Netflix’s own movies and shows. So, I suggest sticking with the optimized ones for a broader range of options.

Works With: Max

The hide.me servers worked great with the formerly named HBO Max.

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My colleague in the US could also watch several videos with normal servers. But, I still recommend using the streaming ones to save you time in finding the right connection. Since hide.me has servers in all the countries that broadcast Max, it’s possible to change libraries from anywhere. 

Works With: Hulu

Our US tester also managed to securely stream Hulu on his first try using the same optimized server from Texas.

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With the non-optimized servers, he could log in to his account and view all the titles, but clicking on any video resulted in an error.

Works With: Disney+

Disney+ streamed just as well as Max, Hulu, and Netflix with the specialty servers.

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Unfortunately, switching to the standard servers left my US colleague stuck at a buffering icon that never cleared whenever he tried to load the platform.

Works With: BBC iPlayer

A colleague in the UK had no issues live-streaming and watching titles on BBC iPlayer with the optimized servers.

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The same connection supported secure streaming on ITVX. Unfortunately, the standard servers were ineffective with this platform.

Also Works With: ESPN and Amazon Prime Video

Once again, the streaming-optimized servers performed well with ESPN and Amazon Prime Video. Our US correspondent reported no issues while using them. However, after switching to standard servers, he couldn’t find a suitable one for ESPN, and none of them worked with Amazon Prime Video.

Since hide.me worked well with most platforms, securely accessing other popular streaming services from anywhere will likely be easy. 

Speed — Decent Speeds on Most Servers

The VPN’s premium tier regularly gives us good results on almost all the servers.

On the other hand, the free servers are too slow to offer a smooth online experience. From Kenya, I tested each free location (none was close to me) and saw significant speed drops. However, when I switched to the paid servers in the same locations, the decrease in speed was much smaller.

There are 3 main categories we look at when recording connection speeds:

• Download speeds. This shows how quickly you can receive information. It’s important for things like streaming, torrenting, and browsing. It’s measured in Mbps (megabits per second).
• Upload speeds. This lets you know how quickly you can send data. You’ll want this to be fast when you’re sending emails or uploading videos. It’s also measured in Mbps.
• Ping. References how fast your data can travel. It lets you know how much latency you’ll have, so it’s crucial for gaming. It’s measured in milliseconds (ms).

We have an ongoing series of tests for all the top vendors. These are done by our speed expert in the US, and they use the premium servers of each VPN. For the hide.me recordings, our tester used the WireGuard protocol, because it was the fastest. The table below displays average speeds from multiple tests per location.

Take a look at hide.me’s results next to other fast VPNs

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hide.me performed well testing servers in both close and mid-range proximity (below 5,000km away). Like most VPNs, speeds declined significantly beyond 6,000km. Some premium VPNs, like ExpressVPN, will give you better speeds, but hide.me is a good choice for uninterrupted online activities.

Bolt “Fast Proxy” is designed by hide.me specifically to improve VPN speeds on Windows. Many VPNs default to UDP for data transfers due to its speed advantages. However, historically, Windows hasn’t handled UDP as efficiently as TCP. Bolt prioritizes TCP to maximize performance. This may boost your speeds, but I didn’t see any difference in my tests.

Gaming — Too Much Lag for Competitive Play

Even with low ping rates (below 90ms), I still couldn’t use hide.me for satisfying gaming sessions. It’s best to have a ping below 80ms if you want to play games without lag. Higher latency leads to a noticeable pause between when you press a button and when your character reacts. This makes it impossible to play at your best, and it’s not much fun.

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My experience with World of Tanks (WoT) was similar to my attempts at playing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Warframe, as I struggled to secure wins due to excessive lag. The free servers failed to support gameplay for either title. I was continually plagued by error messages such as “Connection Interrupted” and “Server Does Not Respond. Try Again Later”. You can play online games competitively with a secure VPN from this list.

Server Network — A Fairly Large Selection With Specialized Servers

You get 2.600 servers in 91 countries with hide.me, which gives you a lot of options. This is slightly more locations than the average VPN offers, but some of the very best providers do give you more servers. However, I like that hide.me’s servers are pretty well-distributed around the world.

Most of the servers are in Europe (with 30+ locations). It even has some rarer locations like Bulgaria and Croatia, which you don’t see in a ton of VPNs. There are 25+ in the Americas and 20+ in Asia (including Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam, and the Philippines) and the rest of the world.

This is somewhat typical for VPNs, but there are some with more servers in Asia and Africa. For example, Surfshark has 25+ locations in Asia and several more African options.

8 countries come with city-level servers: France, the UK, Switzerland, the US, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, and Australia. The US has the most locations, with 16 regions offered.

These let you pinpoint your location more accurately so you can find the fastest nearby servers. Some VPNs come with a little more, but this is a solid selection.

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It also lets you connect to different locations with its free tier. These are in Finland, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the US, Germany, the UK, and Singapore.

I never experienced any connectivity issues while testing both the free and paid servers. My connection remained stable, and only took a few seconds to establish.

It owns all of its servers, so you don’t have to worry about any middleman. Many VPNs have to rent at least some of their infrastructure due to costs. So, this is one big benefit of using hide.me. Below, you’ll find a few more cool privacy features hide.me’s network offers that help it stand out.

Best Location

This feature automatically sets you up with a fast server based on your geographical location. It helps you achieve the best possible connection speed by analyzing factors such as server load, distance, and latency.

No Virtual Locations

All of hide.me’s servers are physically located and are RAM-only. Virtual servers aren’t actually in the country where they set you up with an IP. This does come with some benefits because it lets providers connect you to countries where it’s dangerous to house servers. However, I like that with hide.me, you always know exactly how far away a server really is.

Memory-erasing servers enhance your online safety by deleting your web history with every reboot. This feature is beneficial because it minimizes the possibility of the VPN retaining any sensitive information, such as your web history, that could be linked back to you.

Fixed IP Addresses

Every subscription to hide.me comes with fixed IPs that are yours as long as you stay connected. Upon disconnection, the IP may be reassigned to someone else, especially if a server is experiencing high traffic. This is unlike a dedicated IP, which is yours alone, and I hope hide.me will offer them soon. They’re my go-to when I want to avoid annoying CAPTCHAs.

To reserve a fixed IP, go to your client area on hide.me website and choose your preferred country from the dropdown menu. You’ll receive an IP to input into the ‘Custom Location’ section of your VPN app. Once set, you can use it each time you access that specific country or city.

Optimized Servers

hide.me offers specialized streaming servers in 20+ countries, including Argentina, Australia, the UK, the US, and Brazil. These ones are tailored to optimize the streaming of local content in their respective locations. Few VPNs offer specialty servers for streaming and other activities, so it’s encouraging to see hide.me matching the offerings of industry leaders like CyberGhost.

Security — Tons of Features to Keep You Safe

Security is one category where hide.me excels as it has just about every feature the top VPNs offer. First of all, it passed my leak tests on 16+ servers I tested. I also value its compatibility with IPv6, an increasingly popular technology.

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Its Windows installer and APK file also showed no viruses or malware when I scanned them with VirusTotal. The password generator is another valuable addition to its security suite that I appreciated — it helped me create strong passwords with just one click.

You can even set the VPN to auto-connect under several different conditions. This includes automatically connecting when you turn on your device, when you access a new WiFi network, or when you access a certain IP.

Encryption and Security Protocols

hide.me uses the nearly unbreakable AES 256-bit encryption level to keep you safe online. It’s the standard for all top-ranked VPNs, banks, and governments. It also uses Perfect Forward Secrecy, which just means it’s constantly generating new encryption keys for added security.

You get a ton of different protocols to connect to with hide.me, including the leading options. Here’s a short breakdown of each one and what they offer:

• OpenVPN. This protocol is considered the safest protocol because it’s open source. That means it’s constantly being checked for vulnerabilities by security enthusiasts around the world. The company also claims every connection through OpenVPN will be obfuscated.
• WireGuard. A safe protocol running on newer technology. It’s also the fastest protocol as was seen in our tests.
• IKEv2. This is an older protocol. But it works well for mobile devices because it’s good at switching between different networks.
• SoftEtherVPN. It’s not as secure as OpenVPN but is capable of concealing your VPN usage in restrictive networks like those in schools and workplaces. Unfortunately, this protocol has been causing issues, and hide.me is in the process of phasing it out. So, I suggest you opt for OpenVPN instead to sidestep any inconvenience.
• SSTP. You can also use this protocol to conceal your VPN usage in restrictive networks. However, its potential vulnerability to backdoors makes it less appealing.

The table below displays the protocols supported on each device:

The default setting upon installing hide.me is “Automatic.” However, if you prefer to change it, each protocol option comes with a straightforward explanation below it to help you decide.

Multihop

This is a double VPN feature, and hide.me lets you run your traffic through any combination of its servers. I like this because most VPNs only let you connect to set pairs of servers. That’s if they even offer double VPN at all.

Your choice of servers greatly influences the overall experience. Most of the time, routing your traffic through 2 servers substantially lowers your speeds. For example, in my tests, a pair of nearby servers (South Africa and Egypt) reduced my speed by 21.5%, while distant ones (Australia and Brazil) cut it by 67.9%.

However, this isn’t a feature I really use. That’s because hide.me offers such powerful encryption that there isn’t much reason to send your connection through a second server. But, it’s nice that it’s there for people who want to be extra cautious.

SmartGuard

This is hide.me’s ad-blocker, and it comes with tons of options. You can set it up to block ads, malware, trackers, force SafeSearch with search engines, and even let you set up parental filters.

While it won’t block everything, I appreciate that you get hide.me’s ad-blocker with regular subscriptions at no extra cost. It helped me block all ads on CNN and Speedtest.net, and its parental filter prevented access to adult content sites. Unfortunately, it doesn’t support multihops that include streaming servers.

Kill Switch

This blocks your connection in case the VPN suddenly disconnects, and it’s a crucial feature that keeps you from going online unprotected.

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The VPN’s kill switch consistently cut off my connection during server switches and power flickers. It’s a vital safety feature, and I’d steer clear of any service missing it.

StealthGuard

I thought this was obfuscation at first, but StealthGuard actually gives you more auto-connect options. Many VPNs use the word stealth to describe technology they use to hide your VPN use, which is what threw me off. However, StealthGuard just makes sure you don’t go online without a VPN connection. You can also use it to make sure your selected apps don’t go online until hide.me connects first.

Split Tunneling

You can use this feature to choose what traffic goes through the VPN. For example, I like to keep my banking app out of the VPN tunnel. That way, I don’t have to worry about scaring my bank while I’m using hide.me to protect my privacy online.

Proprietary DNS servers

The VPN uses its own DNS servers to prevent your ISP or other potential snoopers from seeing which websites you visit. These servers can also help you mitigate DNS poisoning, where hackers redirect you to malicious websites. hide.me’s own DNS servers prevent the risk of such redirects to sites you don’t intend to visit.

Privacy — An Excellent No-Logs Policy That Has Been Proven

This is one of the most trustworthy VPNs around, and it’s headquartered in a privacy-friendly country. It’s also owned by eVenture Ltd, an IT security company that has never had any controversies. Now that it owns all of its server network, there isn’t much more hide.me could do to improve when it comes to privacy.

It’s also involved with i2Coalition — an organization fighting for internet freedom. This means that hide.me follows i2Coalition’s VPN Trust Initiative (VTI), which are a set of principles that ensure a provider is transparent and more privacy-friendly. It makes VPNs promise not to siphon data, practice false advertising, and more.

Does hide.me Keep Logs? No

Hide.me never records your IP address, browsing activities, or timestamps. The only information it retains is your monthly data usage and email, which is stored in encrypted form on completely encrypted servers. For enhanced privacy, you can register using a temporary email and pay in cryptocurrencies.

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The VPN even offers an option to remove your email after signing up. While this is beneficial for privacy, if you’ve used a one-time email for sign-up, I advise against removing it, as it could restrict functionality, such as password resets.

However, it retains your randomly generated username and the server you’ve connected to, but they get securely erased every few hours. It also collects website usage data, solely to improve its services. You’re also just as safe using the free service because it follows the same policy.

Was hide.me Audited? Yes

Its policy was audited by a reputable firm in 2015. This audit was carried out by Leon Juranic of DefenseCode LTD, a renowned cybersecurity expert. His evaluation affirmed the company’s adherence to its policy. Plus, since 2012, hide.me has upheld transparency by routinely issuing reports disclosing legal requests, each showing it doesn’t have any customer data to share.

Recently, hide.me passed the independent MASA audit. This program, spearheaded by the App Defense Alliance, a coalition of Google and mobile app security vendors, looks at authentication, information handling, encryption, and more. Regularly undergoing these tests demonstrates that hide.me truly cares about your online privacy.

Based in Malaysia

Malaysia is outside of the 5/9/14 Eyes Alliance, and it has no data retention laws, so it’s a great place to run a VPN. The 5/9/14 Eyes Alliance is an agreement between several governments to share data on their citizens. So, this is just one more reason hide.me is super privacy-friendly.

Does hide.me Work in China? Yes

Customer support confirmed that you can use hide.me in China, and they recommend starting with the free version to assess its effectiveness within the country.

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There aren’t many VPNs that reliably work in China, so I’m happy that hide.me still can. Given the government’s active efforts to block VPN access in the country, I recommend you download hide.me before your visit. You’ll also find helpful guides on hide.me’s website on how to use the service there.

Many VPNs have been banned in China, but there are no known public cases in which the government has prosecuted individuals for their use. However, my team and I strictly advise against using VPNs for any illegal activities. We recommend you read up on the laws before deciding to use a VPN in China.

Torrenting — Securely Download Files on All Premium Servers

I could download files at nearly the same speed as I do with no VPN connected. While on a nearby South African server, I downloaded a 909MB file in 11.08 minutes using the VPN. With my base connection, the same copyright-free file took just 10.18 minutes. This is great since hide.me doesn’t have a local server in Kenya, where I am.

You can even hasten downloads by enabling dynamic port forwarding (UPnP/NAT-PMP) and setting up a SOCKS proxy. The provider doesn’t offer static port forwarding due to security concerns. Instead, it provides Dynamic Port Forwarding as a more secure alternative, which you can activate through the desktop app’s built-in functionality or manually.

The manual way requires adding @pf suffix to your username before initiating a VPN connection. This addition helps hide.me identify your preference and adjust the network settings accordingly. If you’re using hide.me desktop apps, you can skip the hassle of adding the suffix by simply enabling this feature with a single click.

Both features improved my download speeds. UPnP increased it by 6%, and configuring the SOCKS proxy alongside UPnP resulted in a 19% faster download. hide.me encourages the responsible use of UPnP due to the potential risks involved.

It even takes it a step further by marking it as “Optional” in the torrenting guide. The VPN also recommends binding torrent clients to the VPN via SOCKS proxy for P2P activities, and I value the detailed guide provided.

Its solid privacy policy and great security features also make hide.me an excellent option for P2P. You never know who you’re connecting to on one of these networks, and it’s easy to download a mislabeled file. So, it’s a good idea to protect yourself with a VPN like hide.me.

hide.me’s free tier didn’t allow me to download any files. Although the support team clarified that torrenting is exclusive to premium servers, I wanted to double-check because I’ve seen other VPNs’ free versions allow it despite restrictions.

While torrenting is legal in most countries, downloading copyrighted files isn’t. I recommend you only download files in the public domain to make sure you don’t break any laws.