Last updated Oct 11, 2021 at 6am ET
The Amazon Fire Stick has been a huge hit across the world. This tiny little device opens up a vast library of content, including Netflix, YouTube, Twitch, and channels like TED TV, BBC News, and Al Jazeera.
And if you jailbreak an Amazon Fire Stick, the choices expand even further. With Kodi installed, it will let you enjoy almost any movie you’d care to mention, alongside live sports, enormous archives of TV shows, and much, much more.
Why you need to use a VPN with your Fire Stick
There are plenty of good reasons to add a VPN to your Fire Stick setup.
For one thing, if you don’t use your Fire TV Stick with a VPN, any channels watched via Kodi or other streaming services can be tracked with ease. If you’re violating copyrights then you’d rather stay out of sight.
Additionally, some streaming services use geo-blocking to limit the content Fire Stick users can see based on their location. Netflix is notorious in this regard, and using a reliable Virtual Private Network is one of the best solutions.
Using a VPN can also help to deal with ISP throttling. This might occur when you start ramping up the amount of data you consume, causing your ISP to subtly limit connection speeds. A VPN will help you bypass this.
So, having a good VPN matters. But which one should you choose?
In this article, we’ll be looking at one popular option: Turbo VPN. Free of charge and easy to use, Turbo VPN may be the Fire Stick privacy tool you’ve been seeking. So let’s find out how simple it is to install, and whether it’s the best app to choose.
Does Turbo VPN work with the Amazon Fire Stick?
Before you get excited and start planning how to hook up your favorite free Virtual Private Network with an Amazon Fire Stick device, we’ve got bad news: Turbo VPN doesn’t have a Fire TV Stick app.
However, there may be some good news for Fire Stick users. Turbo VPN can actually be installed via an APK (Android Application Package) onto the streaming stick. If you don’t mind following a few tutorial steps, it could be a decent free VPN option.
Getting Turbo VPN working on your Amazon Fire Stick: the basics
Before we can load up Turbo VPN on Fire Stick, we’ll need to change your Fire Stick OS settings to accommodate a custom VPN.
- Load up your Fire Stick and navigate to Settings, followed by Device.
- At this point, scroll down a bit until you see Developer Options.
- You should see an option entitled Apps from Unknown Sources. Toggle that option to On.
- You should also see an option entitled ADB Debugging. Toggle that on as well.
- Now, head back to the System menu you navigated to earlier.
- Choose the About option, followed by Network.
- This should call up a variety of useful pieces of information about your Amazon Fire Stick. For our purposes, we just need the IP address, so note it down on a scrap of paper.
Your Fire Stick is now ready to receive a third party VPN that isn’t available through the Amazon Fire Stick Store.
After that, we need to add Turbo’s APK file. Let’s have a look at how to do so.
Adding the Turbo VPN APK to your Amazon Fire Stick device
This stage is trickier, but you shouldn’t have too many problems.
Before we get into the Fire TV Stick steps, we need one very important piece of information: a direct download link for the Turbo VPN APK. You can find this via Google Search (for “Turbo VPN APK” or similar terms). Alternatively, you can head to a site like APKMonk, which lets you right click on the download button to acquire the APK download address.
Now that you’ve got the APK download link as required, we can conclude the Turbo VPN installation process.
- Head to your Amazon Fire Stick front end.
- Go to the search box and type Downloader. This should call up Amazon’s Downloader app. You can probably guess what we’ll need that for.
- That’s right. The Downloader app has a box where you can enter the Turbo VPN APK download address we found earlier. Enter that carefully (or the URL of the page with the link on), then press Download.
- The Turbo VPN files will be downloaded to your Fire Stick. Most of the time, the APK will automatically install at this point.
- If for some reason the installation doesn’t happen automatically, head to Downloader. Now, access your files, and choose the downloaded APK.
- When the APK has been installed on your Fire Stick, it will be added to your list of apps, and is ready to open. Search for Turbo VPN and fire it up, add your credentials to access the VPN’s servers, and you should enjoy the protection that Turbo provides.
Is this the best privacy solution for Amazon Fire Stick users?
We definitely recommend installing a Virtual Private Network on your Amazon Fire Stick device. That way, you can take your streaming stick anywhere in the world and access whatever content you desire. It’s just a no-brainer for Netflix or YouTube fans who hate “content not available in your region” messages.
However, this doesn’t mean that Turbo VPN is necessarily the best way to go.
For one thing, Turbo isn’t designed for use with Amazon Fire Sticks. This doesn’t just make it clumsy to install, it could also mean that the DNS/IP protection, encryption, and general speeds are inferior to specialist VPNs.
More importantly, Turbo isn’t really in the top tier of global VPNs. Although it’s a popular free option, which makes it very appealing for entry level users, Turbo doesn’t have a strong reputation for speeds (ironically), isn’t the most secure provider around, and is based in China. China isn’t a privacy-friendly jurisdiction by any means, so there’s always a chance that your streaming will be spied on or blocked. As a matter of fact, you won’t be able to access Netflix using the free version.
Amazon’s Fire Stick store is a good place to look for reliable alternatives. Some of our favorites include NordVPN, ExpressVPN, and IPVanish. All of them require a subscription fee, but all are relatively affordable, and each of them is very reliable. Unless you’re dead set on using a free provider, try them before installing Turbo VPN on Fire Stick.
- Excellent security
- Great server list
- Awesome for Netflix
- Good for torrenting
- Very easy to use
- Affordable prices
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