ProtonVPN offers a free VPN. It does not have many of the negatives of other “free” VPN’s (poor security, bandwidth throttling, data limits, and logging). Proton’s VPN does not impose limits on bandwidth or on use, and it does not log your use of it.
While there are paid VPN solutions (NordVPN and Mullvad, for example) for those who need higher speed, highly secure DNS, and the ability to choose a foreign IP address), Proton chooses a foreign IP address for you based on best performance and its free version does not offer granular controls a power user may want. Its main limitation is that it can be used on ONLY ONE DEVICE. For many, that’s going to be your phone.
On a Phone
https://protonvpn.com/free-vpn
Here are Proton’s configuration instructions for a variety of platforms.
https://protonvpn.com/support/protonvpn-setup-guide/
The install process is fairly straightforward: create a Proton Mail account and use it for the VPN. Go to the Apple store (or the Google Play store) and download the ProtonVPN app and begin the install process. You will need to authorize a VPN profile installation on your phone, enter the phone’s PIN code, and click on “Connect.” When the VPN is working you will see a GREEN screen with a radar icon showing where your internet traffic APPEARS to be coming from. When you don’t want to use VPN anymore, click on “Disconnect.”
On a Desktop
Despite the limitation of VPN on one device only (your phone) for your Proton account, you can still use ProtonVPN on a desktop computer. The trick here is to use the Vivaldi browser, which you can download below. Although Vivaldi has mobile versions of its browser, the following guide refers ONLY to the desktop version:
Before you begin, create a Vivaldi account, which (like Proton) gives you an extra email address but is primarily used for synchronizing your settings with additional Vivaldi browsers on desktops and mobile devices. Recently Vivaldi introduced ProtonVPN as a free option, and you will need a Vivaldi account to use it on the desktop:
https://login.vivaldi.net/profile/id/signup
For a description of Vivaldi’s offering of ProtonVPN see:
https://vivaldi.com/protonvpn/
Click on the VPN icon at the top right of the browser window and log in to your VIVALDI account – not the ProtonVPN version you will be using on your phone.
