Buy VPN: the three numbers to read before you click

Printed prices, verified

Before you click buy

1. Find the term the price requires. The headline monthly figure is a total divided by a prepaid term, and the term is printed beside it. Twenty-seven months, thirty-nine months, twenty-four: that is the commitment, and it is the number the advert leaves out of the headline.
2. Find the renewal. On nine of the eleven priced providers here the plan renews at a multiple of what you paid. The renewal is on the same page, usually a line below the price and in smaller type, and it is what the subscription costs from the end of the term onward.
3. Check the refund window and what starts it. Thirty days is standard across this index and CyberGhost publishes forty-five on its longest plan. The clock starts at purchase, not at first use, and the request goes to the provider rather than the app store that took your money.
4. Buy the term you would actually stay for. A three-year prepayment is only cheap if you keep it for three years. If you are not sure, the monthly plan costs several times as much per month and lets you find out.

What the buy page does not show you

The purchase flow is optimised for the headline. What it does not put in front of you is the second payment: the renewal, which arrives automatically at the end of the term on every provider here that has one. Private Internet Access autorenews at $69.81 every three years; CyberGhost at $51.74 annually; ExpressVPN at $99.95 annually; NordVPN at $139.08 annually. All four are quoted from those providers' own pages in the table above.

None of that is hidden, exactly. It is printed, in smaller type, on the page you are buying from, and it is the number this index exists to put beside the headline rather than below it.

The two providers with nothing to fall off

IVPN prints $6 a month and $60 a year with no intro rate. Mullvad prints a flat EUR 5 a month with no term. Neither has a renewal because neither has an introductory price, which makes them the simplest purchases in this market and the most expensive on the headline.

Whether that is the better buy depends entirely on how long you keep it, which is the one thing no pricing page can tell you and the reason the term column matters as much as the price column.

Common questions

What is the cheapest way to buy a VPN?

On the headline, the longest prepaid term from the provider asking for it. Over four or five years the ranking changes, which is what the renewal column shows.

Can I get a refund if I change my mind?

Every provider in this index publishes a money-back window, commonly thirty days and forty-five on CyberGhost's longest plan. It runs from purchase and the request goes to the provider.

Should I buy monthly or take the term?

Monthly if you are testing or unsure; the term if you already know it works on your devices. The monthly plans here run several times the headline rate.

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