Private Internet Access (PIA) Review

Private Internet Access (PIA) Review

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Private Internet Access is a longtime veteran of the VPN industry – but a lot has changed in the past few years.

In our Private Internet Access (PIA) review, we set out to find out how VPNs are ramping up in the face of competition. To do this, we bought a subscription, researched the company, and tested the VPN well to see:

• How fast are the PIA servers in various locations across the US and Europe?
• How well do VPN apps work?
• Does this VPN have any data leaks or security issues?
• Does it work well with Netflix and other streaming services?

So let’s start with an overview of our findings before we get into the details.

Overview of Private Internet Access

Here is a brief overview of the test results and research findings for this PIA review:

+ Pros

• Easy to use and secure VPN apps
• Additional privacy and security features
• Tested and Proven No Logs VPN Provider
• low prices

– cons

• Slow and inconsistent speeds
• Based in the US (Bad Privacy Jurisdiction)
• Doesn’t work well with Netflix and streaming
• Now part of the VPN conglomerate (Kape)

Additional search results:

• PIA Support Tests
• Convicted crypto criminal named PIA’s chief technology officer
• Does PIA work well for torrenting?

Pros of private internet access

Easy to use and secure VPN apps

Private Internet Access offers a great selection of VPN apps for desktop and mobile operating systems. In addition to this, PIA also has browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox and Opera browsers. Below you can see all the PIA VPN apps:

PIA offers applications for desktop and mobile operating systems, as well as browser extensions.

NoticeableMost of the leading VPNs today support more than just desktop and mobile operating systems. PIA does not fall into this category. For comparison, we noted in the Surfshark vs NordVPN report that both of these services support gaming platforms, Smart TVs, Firestick, routers, and all major desktop and mobile operating systems.

PIA Windows App

For this PIA review, I thoroughly tested the Windows VPN client. Overall, the Windows client feels polished and easy to use as well. I also liked the “dark mode” design. Below you can see the PIA Windows client that expands or collapses to reveal more settings and options. Here’s the folded version showing basic contact information:

The app hovers over the tray in the lower right corner of the desktop. In addition to all the features we covered above, the PIA desktop client also has:

• Light and dark modes
• Settings to open the VPN client at system startup
• Connect in playback settings (to a specific VPN server)
• Different language settings
• Customizable DNS Options
• Shipping Port

In general, PIA desktop clients work well. It might be a good choice if you want an easy-to-use VPN for PC operating systems.

Security and privacy tests

Most of the people using VPNs today need a secure and data leak-free service. And while data leaks are common with free VPN apps, that’s not something we should expect with a premium (paid) service that promises security.

To test this, I ran both Windows and Mac OS clients through some basic VPN tests and checks to identify leaks or broken features.

Below, I am testing the PIA Windows VPN client for leaks while connected to a server in Sweden. You can see that no leaks were found, with my real IPv6 address being blocked (PIA does not support IPv6).

I also tested the PIA Mac OS client and found it to be secure and free of leaks. Although I am not sure I would consider PIA one of the best VPNs for Mac, it may still be a suitable option for Mac users.

PIA also implements a good kill switch with their VPN apps, which will block traffic if the VPN connection drops for any reason. This ensures that all traffic remains encrypted and protected by the VPN tunnel.

The PIA lock switch has three levels:

1. Off: Does not block any traffic
2. Auto: Blocks external traffic when the VPN is on
3. Always: It also blocks all traffic when VPN is off

When testing the lock switch with several interruptions, everything seemed to work fine.

Additional privacy and security features

Despite being a basic VPN service, Private Internet Access still offers some good privacy and security features.

In addition to the multi-level lock switch we discussed above, PIA also provides:

• Various data encryption options, including Wireguard
• The VPN ad blocking feature is called Piya Mas

First, the WireGuard protocol is an excellent feature that usually offers significant advantages with performance. However, in our PIA review tests, WireGuard’s speeds weren’t very good (we’ll check out slower ones below). However, WireGuard VPN protocol still offers some advantages, including upgraded security and more reliability on mobile devices.

Below you can see the encryption options in the PIA Windows app:

In most cases, WireGuard protocol offers significant advantages over OpenVPN. For example, you can really see that in our recent NordVPN vs IPVanish comparison.

PIA MACE Ad Blocker

Another good feature offered by PIA is the ad blocker, which they call PIA MACE.

PIA MACE blocks domains for ads, trackers, and malware. Unlike some other ad blocker options, PIA MACE does not have the ability to whitelist specific domains, or adjust filter settings. It is simply on or off.

While some ad blockers are better than no ad blocker, I would not recommend using PIA MAC as your primary ad blocking tool. When I tested different VPN ad blocking tools, I found that PIA’s ad blocker did not block as many domains as the other options.

In terms of VPN ad blockers, NordVPN, Surfshark, and Perfect Privacy performed better than PIA, while PureVPN and CyberGhost performed worse. We compare and contrast the two in our Surfshark vs PIA guide.

Overall, PIA does well in terms of security and privacy features, even if the ad blocker isn’t very powerful.

PIA is a Tried and Proven ‘No Logs’ VPN

Many VPN services claim to be “no logs” – but few have actually been tested and/or verified.

Private Internet Access is one of the few verified no-logs VPN services that has survived real-world tests. There were two separate cases in court where Private Internet Access was subpoenaed for data records, but they were unable to provide any information.

The first court case occurred in 2016 when the FBI demanded records relating to a PIA user who was allegedly making bomb threats. As discussed in official court records, the only information the PIA was able to provide was a set of VPN IP addresses allegedly used in the crime:

A summons has been sent to London Trust Media [Private Internet Access] The only information they can provide is that the set of IP addresses used were from the East Coast of the United States.

The second case took place in court in June 2018, when US authorities again demanded data records for a criminal investigation. Again, however, PIA was unable to provide any data on the accused VPN user:

John Allan Arsenault, general counsel for London Trust Media, a VPN company, has testified about a number of VPN companies, including his, that do not intentionally keep records of their customers’ internet activity so that they cannot be served in response to subpoenas from law enforcement or others. London Trust Media operates the Private Internet Access (PIA) brand, which owns several of the IP addresses used to hack Embarcadero Media.

Private Internet Access does not log user activity, such as what files they access or changes they make to a website.

While PIA has not been audited to verify “no-logs” policies, such as NordVPN and VyprVPN, these two cases certainly validate their claims.

Court cases are already a good test to verify logging claims. After all, a court case revealed that PureVPN was logging customer data and handing it over to US authorities, despite claiming it was a “no logs” VPN service. (You can get the details in our PureVPN review.)

You can read the PIA Privacy Policy for more information.

Low prices for PIA subscriptions

Private Internet Access was once among the best cheap VPNs on the market, at very reasonable rates.

There are now three basic levels of pricing:

PIA offers low prices on subscriptions.

At less than $3 per month with the two-year plan, PIA is very affordable. They do not currently offer any free trials. However, with a 30-day refund window, it works like a free VPN trial allowing you to test the service and cancel it if you don’t like it.

Return Policy – All plans come with a 30-day refund policy, which is roughly average for the VPN industry. Reading the terms of service, I found some exceptions to the 30-day refund window:

Due to limitations with third-party payment processors, PIA cannot directly recover some accounts. Accounts purchased through the Apple Store, Giftcards, or third-party deal sites can only be redeemed by a payment processor.

It’s interesting to see a reference to “Giftcards” in the refund policy because PIA doesn’t offer this payment option anymore. Your refund will also be refused if you “materially violated” any part of the Terms of Service.

Payment Options At the time of the PIA review, they currently offer four different payment methods, as you can see below:

This is a good set of options. Some VPNs do not even support cryptocurrency payments, as we noted in our IPVanish review. Overall, this is another strong point of PIA.

Now let’s move on to some of the disadvantages of private internet access.

Disadvantages of private internet access

Now that we’ve covered some of the pros of PIA, we’ll take a look at the cons.

Slow and inconsistent speeds

One of the biggest drawbacks we noted in the PIA review was performance. This was somewhat surprising, given that most VPNs that support WireGuard have excellent performance. With PIA, I ran several speed tests on a 500Mbps (base speed) internet connection from my test lab in the US.

In order to give PIA the best possible performance test, I chose WireGuard VPN Protocol Run speed tests using the latest version of the PIA Windows client. Now let’s examine the results.

Here was a PIA server in the format Seattle in a 41 Mbps:

This is really bad. Getting only 41 Mbps on a 500 Mbps connection is definitely slower than average. So let’s check out some other sites.

Here was a PIA server in the format Los Angeles, California at 85 Mbps:

While this is better than the previous test result, it is still very slow. We should get speeds over 200Mbps, especially with the WireGuard protocol.

Next, I tested the PIA server in New York, which gave me about 23Mbps.

With PIA servers in the US, it’s clear that This is a slow VPN.

For the final speed test, I decided to try a location across the pond in the UK. Here was a PIA server in the format London, UK, who gave me 10 Mbps.

With slow speeds like this, PIA is definitely not the best VPN for the UK if you value performance.

In previous PIA reviews, speeds were better. Speeds with Private Internet Access seem to be getting worse, even after adding WireGuard.

Compared to PIA’s Faster VPNs

For comparison, the fastest VPN we tested here on restoring privacy is NordVPN. It also supports WireGuard protocol and has a huge global network of fast servers. We can routinely get speeds of over 300Mbps in our NordVPN review tests. Here is one server location in Seattle at 445Mbps:

This NordVPN speed test result shows how slow PIA is compared to other leading VPNs.

Check out NordVPN with…

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