Surfshark is CNET’s top pick for the best cheap VPN, thanks to its innovative feature set, outstanding speed performance, top-notch privacy protections and budget-friendly annual subscription plan. Surfshark is easy to use across all platforms and excellent for streaming -- especially if you want to maximize yourNetflix viewing options. Granted, Surfshark’s monthly subscription is quite a bit more expensive than the competition, but if you sign up for an annual or two-year plan, you’ll pay far less than what you would for most other top VPNs’ long-term subscriptions. Surfshark isn't just one of the top affordable VPNs -- it's one of the best VPNs on the market, period.

Private Internet Access, or PIA, is another solid budget-friendly VPN that has a strong reputation for privacy and transparency. PIA's apps have many customization options and are simple to use. It also has great options for streaming, but users with slow connections may struggle with PIA's rather slow speed performance. Nevertheless, PIA is an excellent, cheap VPN at just $40 for the first year (renewing at $50 annually). While it's sluggish -- we clocked an average 48% speed loss -- it's a good budget pick that undercuts most of the competition and works well for folks with fast internet speeds.

Mullvad rounds out our list of the best cheap VPNs. Its fast speeds, easy-to-use app and innovative privacy features all for a flat fee of $5 per month make this Swedish-based provider a great choice for privacy-conscious people on a budget. It's decent for streaming, but Mullvad struggles with some streaming services and doesn't offer full native app support for smart TVs or streaming devices. It's an otherwise well-rounded privacy-focused VPN that's a fantastic bargain.

While there's much to consider when selecting a VPN, from speed to streaming performance, many people are looking for the cheapest VPN. Whereas monthly prices range from around $5 to $15, annual plans vary from $40 to $100 for the first year -- most VPNs hit you with price hikes. However, price isn’t the only factor -- you'll want to think about value, and many wallet-friendly VPNs punch well above their weight class.

What we’ve learned from testing VPNs over the past decade is that you can’t just buy the most expensive VPN and expect to get the most bang for your buck. We've found expensive VPNs that failed to deliver in just about every way you can think of, from poor device support and buggy client apps to completely inadequate speeds and shocking privacy practices. The upside to this is that you don’t necessarily need to pay a premium price to get access to a top-notch VPN. There are a select few VPNs that tick all the boxes and even deliver unique features you won’t find elsewhere, all while maintaining very competitive pricing.  

If you want to maximize your savings, we recommend springing for a yearly subscription rather than month-to-month, because you'll typically enjoy greater long-term savings. While a monthly plan gives you the flexibility to cancel at any time, most VPN companies offer a yearly plan that boasts a lower per-month rate than a monthly plan. Although a multi-year subscription typically delivers the greatest savings, we generally recommend sticking to annual packages –- they offer significant savings without locking you into a single provider for too long. It’s a fast-moving industry, so your VPN provider may suffer slower speeds, get acquired or have a data breach during the course of a year.

The cheap VPNs we've highlighted on this page are all excellent, top-tier options that cater to a wide variety of use cases, from basic privacy to streaming. Best of all, each one is supremely gentle on your pocketbook.

Based on our experience testing, using and researching VPNs, these are the most important factors to consider when choosing the best cheap VPN for your needs.

Cost

If your objective is to find the cheapest VPN for your needs, then price will likely be your primary consideration. Some VPNs cost up to $100 or more per year, but the cheapest VPNs can give you many of the same privacy features and protections for just $40 to $60 per year. Keep in mind that some VPN providers offer an introductory rate that will increase after your subscription renews. Generally, you can find the renewal price when you click through to the payment window, but sometimes you may have to go digging through the terms of service pages to find the true yearly cost of a VPN.

Privacy

Privacy is a major consideration for any VPN, regardless of what kind of VPN you want. The best VPNs all have privacy protections like a kill switch and DNS leak protection, along with a no-logs policy and AES 256-bit encryption (over OpenVPN and IKEv2) or ChaCha20 with WireGuard. Depending on the level of privacy you need, you can get a cheap VPN that offers additional features like Tor over VPN, obfuscation and multihop connections.  

Speed

A VPN will oftenslow down your connection speeds by 50% or more. So you’ll want to look for a VPN that will cut your speeds by as little as possible -- ideally less than 20% so that you’ll barely even notice a difference.Fast VPN speeds are essential for data-heavy activities like streaming, gaming, downloading and video conferencing. A fast VPN will easily handle all those activities, whereas slow VPN speeds may be suitable only for basic internet browsing. The fastest VPNs we tested include NordVPN, Proton VPN and ExpressVPN, all of which offered reliable connection speeds.

Usability

Getting a cheap VPN doesn’t necessarily have to mean that you have to sacrifice usability. Many of the more budget-friendly VPN options are miles ahead of their pricier peers in terms of user-friendliness. Look for a VPN that works well across all the devices you want to use. Your VPN should be as easy to use as any other app you may download and should require little to no learning curve.  

We tested VPNs" target="_self from January through March 2025, putting each VPN through a battery of tests to see how it stacks up to our expectations and the rest of the competition. We rated each service on connection speed, features, privacy, usability and overall value.

Value assessment

Value is our biggest consideration when naming the best cheap VPNs. Some services offer advanced features at advanced prices -- while those might be good options for someone looking for the best overall VPN, they're not always the best choice for people looking for a good cheap VPN. We assess the quality of service and features against each VPN's initial and renewal prices and the transparency of those renewals. For this list, we prioritized services that quality features at a cheaper price than other competitors.

Connection speed testing

We run 250 speed tests for each VPN, measuring the average amount of speed lost across a variety of servers and platforms. This gives us a general sense of how much the service will affect your baseline internet speeds, and we look for VPNs that keep the speed loss to about 20% or less. Surfshark managed this with a respectable 21% speed loss, which is part of what made it our best cheap VPN.

Feature testing

Our feature evaluations look at the breadth of what a VPN can do, plus how effectively it works. A good cheap VPN should still offer a reasonable range of features that work reliably, including things like split tunneling and advanced privacy options.

Privacy evaluation

A good cheap VPN shouldn't sacrifice your privacy. When we test VPNs, we look for details like no-logs policies -- preferably backed up bythird-party audits -- as well as strong encryption, reasonable (and readable) privacy policies and transparency reports. We also test for DNS leaks to make sure the VPN is performing the basics correctly.

Usability assessment

We evaluate how well the VPN performs when streaming and unblocking content from different regions worldwide, and how easy it was to change servers on different platforms. The best VPNs work as expected regardless of platform and are easy enough for beginners to use.

Proton VPN

Proton VPN was developed by the Swiss-based company behind the popular secure email service Proton Mail. The VPN has built a reputation for top-notch security and maximum transparency. Proton VPN's apps are fully open-source, and the software is also regularly audited to help affirm the security of the VPN for users without the time or know-how to inspect the code. On top of security features like akill switch and DNS leak protection, Proton VPN offers extras like malware protection, Tor over VPN and a stealth protocol to help hide the fact that you're using a VPN. If you connect to Proton VPN's Secure Core servers, you'll be able to route your traffic through secure data centers located in Switzerland, Sweden or Iceland before exiting through another location. This provides a critical extra layer of security if you're a user with heightened privacy needs. Aside from its robust privacy protections, Proton does well at unblocking content from various streaming providers, including Netflix.

Proton VPN is an excellent choice for budget-conscious VPN users looking for afree VPN. Proton VPN offers the only free VPN wholeheartedly recommended by CNET because it's private and doesn't put limits on speed, data or usage time -- which is something the vast majority of free VPNs can't claim. The free tier doesn't include torrenting support or access to its Secure Core servers, but it delivers the same encryption standards and includes the same basic privacy protections like a kill switch, DNS leak protection and a no-logging promise.

Free users are allotted one connection at a time and access to servers in five countries (Japan, The Netherlands, United States, Poland and Romania). It’s a great way to test out the service before you upgrade to the premium version, as there are no bandwidth limits or connection timeouts. The only real downside is that you can’t specify the server you connect to, but it’s still totally possible to access Netflix and other streaming sites if you want to see how it performs as an unblocking VPN. If you want to purchase a subscription to Proton VPN, it's more affordable than premium VPN providers like ExpressVPN, although initially not quite as wallet-friendly as rivals including Surfshark and PIA. The monthly plan is on the cheap side at $10 per month, while the annual plan costs $60 for the first year before jumping to $80 annually, and the two-year plan costs $108 for the first 24 months (then $80 annually). Proton's premium plans offer access to 12,000-plus servers peppering 117 countries, and you'll get 10 simultaneous connections. Ultimately, Proton VPN is one of the best cheap VPNs for privacy enthusiasts and entertainment buffs alike.

Read our Proton VPN review

PrivadoVPN

PrivadoVPN is a wallet-friendly VPN provider that sets you back $11 monthly, $20 for the first year (then $60 annually) or $30 total for the first two years (then $96 total for two years). This is an exceptionally cheap introductory offer that even other budget providers like Surfshark and PIA struggle to match. Aside from its paid premium plans, PrivadoVPN offers a free VPN tier giving you access to 13 different international servers, including spots in the US, UK, Canada, France, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands. The zero-cost service lets you pick any server you like, but you're limited to 10GB of monthly usage.

With a paid plan, PrivadoVPN offers hundreds of servers in 49 different countries. That's fine for casual users, but well below the thousands of servers in 100-plus countries that competitors like ProtonVPN, NordVPN, Surfshark and ExpressVPN boast. In our testing, Privado was decent for casual users, providing largely user-friendly apps, solid streaming service unblocking and privacy-friendly jurisdiction.

However, its small server network, unreliable internet download speeds and lack of third-party audits make it tough to recommend for all but basic privacy. Power users seeking blazing-fast speeds for streaming, international travelers or folks with critical privacy needs (like political activists, asylum-seekers or paranoid torrenters) should look elsewhere. But if you need fundamental privacy for web browsing or streaming on a budget, Privado's free or low-cost plans may fit the bill.

Read our PrivadoVPN review.