0.3 C
United States of America
Thursday, January 16, 2025

CyberGhost VPN Overview (2025): Options, Pricing, and Safety


CyberGhost VPN quick details

Our ranking: 4.3 stars out of 5
Pricing: Begins at $6.99 per 30 days (6-month plan)
Key options:

  • Gives servers in 100 nations and 125 places.
  • Consists of streaming, torrenting, and gaming servers.
  • Has beneficiant free trial choices.

CyberGhost VPN has a formidable server fleet spaning 100 nations and 125 places, an inexpensive beginning worth, and specialised servers for streaming, torrenting, and gaming. It additionally helps Home windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android, Android and Apple TV, and even gaming consoles.

Whereas its difficult firm historical past could trigger some concern, the general VPN package deal you get with CyberGhost makes it a worthy VPN alternative of the yr.

CyberGhost VPN pricing

Plans Value
One month $12.99 per 30 days (14-day money-back assure)
Six months $6.99 per 30 days (45-day money-back assure)
Two years $2.03 per 30 days (45-day money-back assure)

Whereas some VPNs supply completely different options at different worth factors, CyberGhost’s pricing is easy. It supplies three costs relying in your most well-liked service size — both one month, six months, or two years. The month-to-month possibility is billed each month, whereas the six-month possibility is billed each six months at $41.94 and the two-year possibility is billed for the primary two years at $56.94 then yearly thereafter.

By way of affordability, you’re going to get essentially the most out of your cash with their two-year plan. At $2.03 per 30 days, CyberGhost is without doubt one of the most inexpensive VPN choices out proper now. That is very true as soon as we keep in mind the variety of servers you get at this worth. Have in mind, nevertheless, that this contract locks you in for 2 years so that you gained’t have the pliability of having the ability to change suppliers rapidly.

In case you’re seeking to take a look at out the VPN for a month, CyberGhost VPN’s $12.99 is on the pricier finish in comparison with its opponents like Proton VPN, with its one-month Plus plan at present priced at $9.99 per 30 days. You additionally don’t get CyberGhost VPN’s in-house NoSpy servers without spending a dime with the one-month plan.

With that, I do want that CyberGhost supplied not less than a one-year possibility for its paid plans as an alternative of its six-month subscription. This might give shoppers extra leeway with value and fewer of the time dedication. Annual plans are additionally commonplace choices for many VPN suppliers. For my part, having a one-year possibility would assist CyberGhost present a greater one-to-one pitch towards its competitors.

Evaluating it to different VPNs, Surfshark’s mid-tier One subscription for one yr is priced at $3.39 per 30 days, whereas NordVPN’s Plus plan is $5.49 per 30 days. At $6.99 per 30 days for under six months, I really feel like CyberGhost could appear to be much less of a discount when taking a look at what different VPNs have to supply.

CyberGhost VPN does have a reasonably beneficiant free trial program. For Home windows and macOS customers, you may get a 24-hour free trial with out offering any fee or bank card info. Android customers even have entry to a three-day trial, whereas iOS customers get free seven-day entry.

Whereas the 24-hour Home windows and Mac trial is brief, accessing all of the premium options with out handing off any monetary info is a worthwhile trade-off.

Is CyberGhost VPN protected?

CyberGhost VPN presents all of the industry-standard safety protocols we count on from an honest VPN in 2023. It has the OpenVPN, IKEv2, and WireGuard protocols, in addition to AES-256 encryption. It additionally has a kill change, DNS leak safety, and break up tunneling functionality.

On its web site, CyberGhost boasts that its headquarters are based mostly in Romania — a rustic with sturdy privateness legal guidelines. It is a massive plus for customers who’re cautious of presidency interference. Nonetheless, it’s price noting that CyberGhost is owned by Kape Applied sciences, previously Crossrider. Crossrider had previously been related to malware and adware controversies earlier than it bought CyberGhost again in 2017.

Whereas CyberGhost has maintained that it acts as an impartial entity of Kape, the corporate historical past is necessary to say in terms of safety and privateness.

CyberGhost does have a no-logs coverage, which states that they don’t log consumer information reminiscent of searching historical past, IP addresses, session durations, and the like. This no-logs coverage has been confirmed by an impartial audit performed by Deloitte in 2022.

In April 2024, CyberGhost accomplished a second impartial audit of its server community and administration methods. The evaluation was performed by Deloitte Audit Romania, which stated that it discovered no proof to conclude that CyberGhost’s “configuration of IT methods and administration of the supporting IT operations” weren’t in accordance with its No-logs Coverage No-Logging Safeguards.

I commend CyberGhost for persevering with its dedication to present process third-party audits. I particularly respect how current their newest audit was, offering an extra layer of confidence to customers involved in buying a CyberGhost subscription right this moment.

The VPN service additionally often publishes quarterly Transparency Stories that cowl police requests and malicious exercise reviews they obtain. That is an admirable stage of transparency that undoubtedly provides to CyberGhost VPN’s total credibility.

With its difficult historical past, potential customers could also be hesitant to think about CyberGhost VPN at first. Nonetheless, I do really feel that the corporate is doing sufficient to alleviate safety considerations prospects could have.

Key options of CyberGhost VPN

CyberGhost VPN supplies an alluring package deal of options for its worth, making it a strong alternative. Let’s check out some key options one after the other.

Intensive server community

Screencapture of CyberGhost VPN showing CyberGhost servers.
CyberGhost servers. Picture: Luis Millares

CyberGhost VPN has one of many largest server suites out there right this moment. On the time of publication, it had servers from 125 places unfold out over 100 nations.

The massive server fleet provides customers a greater likelihood of getting a high-quality server expertise. Whether or not it’s having a server close to your location to get sooner speeds or having extra entry to geo-restricted content material, CyberGhost’s in depth community is unquestionably a helpful function.

That is very true if you buy CyberGhost with their $2 plan, supplying you with a discount package deal that’s arduous to refuse.

Specialised servers

Screencapture of CyberGhost VPN showing CyberGhost specialized servers.
CyberGhost specialised servers. Picture: Luis Millares

CyberGhost VPN presents three specialised servers for among the commonest VPN use-cases. It categorizes servers into three teams: For Gaming, For Torrenting, and For Streaming.

I personally like the extent of element CyberGhost goes into when offering what precisely every server is greatest for.

Screencapture of CyberGhost VPN shwoing CyberGhost streaming servers.
CyberGhost streaming servers. Picture: Luis Millares

For instance, it reveals what streaming service a specific server is greatest for — a small element that I believe many customers will discover extraordinarily useful. If you would like a VPN that makes specialised servers easy, CyberGhost needs to be on the high of your checklist.

Good Guidelines panel

Smart Rules panel in CyberGhost VPN.
Good Guidelines panel. Picture: Luis Millares

CyberGhost has a built-in “Good Guidelines” panel that lets you automate completely different actions you need the VPN to do based mostly on completely different prompts.

For instance, you possibly can set CyberGhost to routinely connect with a specific server upon boot up or have it open an app of your alternative as soon as the VPN is linked. It is a highly effective useability function that shall be good for individuals who need a VPN that may be tailor-made for a selected want or workflow.

RAM-only server expertise

CyberGhost VPN makes use of RAM-only servers that retailer server information on random entry reminiscence as an alternative of arduous disks. Due to this, when a server is unplugged, all information is totally erased.

This supplies an extra layer of safety that many privateness fanatics will respect, particularly since CyberGhost itself designed a system that makes it troublesome for them to retailer consumer information. That is one other plus of CyberGhost’s no-logs coverage.

CyberGhost VPN velocity and efficiency

In my testing, CyberGhost VPN carried out very well. I used to be capable of get good velocity and stability with a number of Chrome tabs open, enjoying 1080p YouTube movies, and utilizing Google Suite apps for work.

The story was the identical when it got here to hurry take a look at outcomes. For uploads,  CyberGhost VPN recorded solely a 12.67% drop in velocity in comparison with my web service supplier — which may be very spectacular since most VPNs battle with sustaining good add velocity. For downloads, CyberGhost carried out even higher because it was truly 9.1% sooner than my ISP. In real-world utilization, I skilled little or no discount in velocity and was completely proud of CyberGhost’s total efficiency.

I did discover that switching from one server to a different took longer than I anticipated. Perhaps that’s a trade-off with the VPN’s large server fleet, inflicting the longer than normal switching. Regardless of this, I’d say that is extra of a private nitpick since I didn’t expertise any dropped connection each time I switched to a brand new server throughout my testing.

For DNS leaks, I ran CyberGhost VPN and quite a lot of its servers from completely different places by way of a public DNS leak device. I skilled zero leaks all all through.

SEE: SMB Safety Pack (TechRepublic Premium)

CyberGhost VPN servers and places

CyberGhost presents servers from 125 places unfold out in 100 nations. For the time being, CyberGhost VPN doesn’t present the precise variety of servers it has in its server community. Nonetheless, third-party reviews estimate it to have round 9,000-11,000 at any given time.

In 2023, I stated CyberGhost had one of many largest server fleets accessible. Whereas that continues to be true in 2024, I need to acknowledge that competing VPNs have caught up on this regard. NordVPN has elevated its server fleet from 60+ to 111 nations in a yr, whereas ExpressVPN has elevated its community from 94 to 105 nations as properly.

That is good for shoppers, as extra VPN choices have a big server suite to supply. Nonetheless, it additionally implies that competitors amongst suppliers is more durable since server fleet dimension is getting nearer and nearer.

Transferring on from its server community, CyberGhost has specialised servers for streaming, gaming, and torrenting, respectively — a function that may profit customers looking out for these particular use circumstances.

Lastly, CyberGhost additionally presents NoSpy Servers, that are servers housed inside the firm’s Romanian headquarters. Which means the servers, and the information they carry, are protected by CyberGhost personnel themselves and can’t be accessed by third events. CyberGhost additionally says that NoSpy servers use extra premium {hardware}, present higher speeds, and have larger bandwidth.

Sadly, you do have to buy not less than a six-month plan to get entry to CyberGhost’s NoSpy servers as this isn’t accessible on the one-month plan.

Whereas extra security-focused servers would spherical out CyberGhost’s VPN servers extra, there’s sufficient selection right here to fulfill lots of people’s VPN wants.

CyberGhost VPN ease of use

For consumer expertise, I discovered CyberGhost to be a blended bag. Whereas its app design isn’t my favourite, I had zero points with it throughout testing.

Full CyberGhost VPN interface.
Full CyberGhost VPN interface. Picture: Luis Millares

I actually respect CyberGhost’s handy categorization of specialised servers. This makes it simple to seek out the perfect server potential for widespread VPN use circumstances, and I imagine needs to be a typical factor executed by all VPNs.

CyberGhost Settings page tabs.
CyberGhost Settings web page tabs. Picture: Luis Millares

On the opposite finish, I do assume CyberGhost can do a greater job of organizing its different menus. Specifically, I discovered its use of a number of Settings pages a bit complicated. There’s a settings web page for the principle VPN, Common settings on your dashboard, and Privateness settings for privacy-related options. For my part, these toggles might both be grouped collectively on one web page or be extra unfold out in separate, particular person tabs in the principle dashboard for a extra intuitive expertise.

CyberGhost VPN execs

  • Massive fleet of servers from 100 nations, 125 places.
  • Specialised servers for gaming, torrenting, and streaming.
  • RAM-only servers that forestall information logging.
  • Reasonably priced two-year subscription.
  • Customizable Good Guidelines panel for automated actions.
  • Free trial.
  • Potential to attach as much as seven units with one subscription.
  • 45-day money-back assure.
  • Straightforward-to-use app.

CyberGhost VPN cons

  • Sophisticated firm historical past.
  • Lack of extra security-focused servers.
  • Desktop interface may very well be extra intuitive.
  • Dear month-to-month subscription.
  • NoSpy servers unavailable in a one-month plan.

How good is CyberGhost VPN?

CyberGhost VPN’s massive server fleet will profit many customers who need flexibility by way of velocity, reliability, and entry to geo-restricted content material. It’s very arduous to argue towards servers throughout 100 nations for under $2 a month (with their two-year plan), to not point out the truth that it’s good for customers who’re particularly on the lookout for a VPN to stream, torrent, or sport.

Whereas CyberGhost VPN is hampered by its controversial firm historical past, its spectacular server fleet, specialised servers, and beneficiant free trial choices make it a VPN that most individuals ought to undoubtedly think about.

CyberGhost VPN alternate options

CyberGhost VPN has a novel set of options that make it a strong VPN service. Nonetheless, these options might not be the right combination for you. We’ve listed a number of alternate options under which will suit your wants higher.

Proton VPN NordVPN Surfshark
Beginning worth (annual) $4.99 per 30 days $4.59 per 30 days $2.99 per 30 days
Server community 9,000+ servers in 112 nations 6,800+ servers in 111 nations 3,200 servers in 100 nations
Spotlight function Based mostly in privacy-friendly Switzerland; open-source VPN Quick efficiency and a wide range of security-focused options reminiscent of anti-malware safety Reasonably priced paid plans throughout the board; quick VPN efficiency

Proton VPN icon.
Picture: Proton VPN

Proton VPN

If you would like a VPN that prioritizes safety towards authorities interference and illegal information requests, Proton VPN needs to be your best choice. Based mostly in Switzerland, Proton operates underneath strict Swiss privateness legal guidelines that add an extra layer of privateness and safety on your private or confidential information.

To study extra, try our full Proton VPN evaluation.

NordVPN icon.
Picture: NordVPN

NordVPN

For extra security-focused options, you possibly can try NordVPN. It has sturdy third-party testing, privacy-centered server sorts, and a novel encrypted file-sharing system that may fulfill even the strictest privateness wants. It additionally has built-in anti-malware menace safety, which makes it a dependable all-around safety platform.

To study extra, try our full NordVPN evaluation.

Surfshark icon.
Picture: Surfshark

Surfshark

For VPN customers who need a number of gadget help, Surfshark is without doubt one of the greatest. It presents a vast variety of simultaneous connections that gained’t have you ever worrying about exceeding a specific gadget restrict. It additionally has sturdy encryption and privateness options for these looking for extra safety.

To study extra, try our full Surfshark VPN evaluation.

How I evaluated CyberGhost VPN

My evaluation of CyberGhost VPN concerned a complete evaluation of its options, value, and real-world efficiency. I used CyberGhost VPN hands-on with their 24-hour free trial on my private Home windows machine.

For velocity, I used Ookla’s public Speedtest to measure obtain and add speeds. I additionally ran CyberGhost by way of DNSLeakTest a number of occasions to examine for any drops in its DNS leak safety.

Lastly, I scored CyberGhost VPN on every part from safety protocols to pricing based mostly on an inside algorithm to get a ranking of 4.3 out of 5 stars. In my scoring, I checked out CyberGhost VPN each by itself and in relation to different VPN companies accessible right this moment.

Related Articles

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Latest Articles