Overview
You must know the feeling when you open a gift you didn’t expect and can’t wait to see what’s inside the box; well, to be honest, this is exactly how we are feeling right before firing up our engines to share with you our PureVPN vs IPVanish comparison.
These two market leader wannabes have some serious claims about their services on their official websites, but that should always be taken with a grain of salt, or rather, two. Marketing mumbo-jumbo can’t always be trusted – and that’s an understatement; hopefully, you’ve realized this already.
Whether PureVPN or IPVanish is the best choice for you greatly depends on your needs and budget. So, allow us to present to you our comparison to uncover the pros and cons of both competitors. Let the battle begin.
Security & Privacy
The pivotal point in the success of a VPN service is online security and privacy. If a VPN solution cannot grant the highest possible level of anonymity for its users, it is as good and effective as a water bucket with holes at the bottom.
IPVanish proudly and bravely claims to be “the world’s best VPN.” While we may think otherwise, we must admit that this VPN does have a good set of privacy features to protect you relatively well against prying eyes. If we compare its features to that of PureVPN, we see essentially the same level of privacy: DNS and IP leak protection, OpenVPN, AES-256 encryption, a kill switch, and no logs policy.
Well, speaking of no logs, PureVPN has a bad record when it comes to keeping users safe and private as promised. Remember the ominous FBI case when the Hong Kong-based VPN service provider helped the US agency identify a user, including his physical location? This case ended with the user apprehended thanks to the logs PureVPN was keeping despite promoting no logs heavily.
In all fairness, we must add that PureVPN has revised its Privacy Policy and removed the excessive no logs promotions from its website since then. But this act surely left a stain in VPN users’ memory; and, to regain trust is not that easy when it comes to online privacy protection solutions.
On a more positive note, we must also mention that PureVPN offers a bit more than IPVanish on this front, including Split Tunneling, dedicated IP addresses, and port forwarding.
But when it comes to data protection and anonymity, IPVanish also has a somewhat risky background as it is based in the US, the most eager Five Eyes country. However, so far there has been no instance for this provider to share identifiable information with any government agencies.
In summary, we believe that the PureVPN vs IPVanish comparison battle is rather balanced at this point. Both competitors are armored with the latest VPN protocols and privacy features that should be just enough for the general user to practice their civil right to stay anonymous online.
Speed
In the previous round, IPVanish claimed to be the number one in the world. Guess what it says about its speed. Yes, it is indeed “the fastest VPN” as per the IPVanish website.
So, let’s see if this provider can actually live up to its words and how PureVPN reacts.
IPVanish has 1300+ servers in 50+ countries, which allow for relatively good speeds in general. Nevertheless, PureVPN has performed an insane VPN server fleet growth in 2019 by almost quadrupling its server list. Right now, this service boasts 2000+ servers in 140+ countries. However, we must mention that many of these are actually virtual locations, which have their own risks when users are not aware of this.
This growth may also help PureVPN to perform better on the speed front. In the past, it was rather annoying to end up with server connection errors and slow speeds because of overcrowded servers. Hopefully, this is a thing of the past now.
Basically, we would say that both VPN services have good enough speeds for your general use, including streaming geo-blocked HD videos or large files as well as online gaming. But, if we consider that by now, PureVPN has twice as many servers in twice as many countries, the numbers force us to make it the winner of this round.
Ease of Use
They say, don’t judge a book by its cover, yet, we need to say this:
If looks and design mattered, we would give this round to IPVanish right away. But, wait a minute… PureVPN came out with a new version again. Well, well, well, what a surprise.
Have you seen the previous PureVPN clients? Well, they are all… what’s the word… PURE. And, not in a good sense, too. If possible, PureVPN used to have the worst-looking interface, one that resembled the work of a teenager without IT skills.
IPVanish is one of the most professional-looking, clean-cut, and intuitive VPN apps, but the new PureVPN clients just caught up with it.
With that said, this round is more about ease of use, of course.
Both competitors offer plenty of security settings to play around with. But, if we have to choose, IPVanish seems the more intuitive and easy to use, too.
All in all, this round is won by IPVanish with its tasteful design and user-friendly apps, but PureVPN can also be proud of its new looks and easier interface.
Torrenting and P2P
If we only looked at promotions and word of mouth, IPVanish would probably win this whole IPVanish vs PureVPN battle easily. In this round, we can quote again to describe this service as “a torrenter’s and gamer’s dream.” However, whenever you read such claims, make sure the source is credible since this quote may well come from the “pen” of an affiliated reviewer.
Although IPVanish has almost all the ingredients for the best VPN for torrenting recipe, including good speeds, good security features (leak protection), and no logs policy, we cannot forget about its US jurisdiction. This makes it a wee-bit less appealing.
PureVPN has improved on this front by installing dedicated and highly optimized P2P servers (1Gbit connection claimed) and acquiring over 2000 servers globally.
If we consider all we know about these two VPNs, it’s fair to conclude that you can use both for torrenting with nearly the same results and efficiency. Another relatively balanced round.
Netflix and China
It’s quite possible that we would never use any of these competitors to watch geo-restricted Netflix shows – unless at gunpoint – but, jokes aside, PureVPN outdoes IPVanish in this round as the latter does not support Netflix anymore. It seems that the IPVanish team gave up the effort after their servers got blocked by the media streamer center.
PureVPN does promote that you can use it for accessing Netflix TV shows and movies; however, even if this is true, you can never know when its servers get banned for trying to avert detection. Still, you have better chances with this VPN to bypass the Netflix defense line.
As for China, both services claim to work in Censorship Land; however, you need to configure your app manually and even then it is not too likely that you will be able to slip through the Great Firewall of China.
This is definitely not a positive round for these VPN leader wannabes because both fall flat in this field since we don’t really count “maybe”-s or “might work”-s.
Compatibility
It seems that our PureVPN vs IPVanish battle is quite balanced after all. When it comes to compatibility, both support basically the same platforms, including Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android, routers, Amazon Firestick TV, consoles, and browsers.
We couldn’t really say that one is better or more equipped than the other. Therefore, this round cannot be the base for your decision. It’s a draw.
Support
If, as a VPN provider, you take your customers seriously, you must have a helpful, dedicated, and 24/7 human support team behind your product. Would you agree?
To be frank, both IPVanish and PureVPN have some issues in this field. Truth be told, there have been lots of changes and improvements in the past year to help users with their technical issues.
Essentially, both VPNs offer 24/7 live chat support now and both are relatively fast and effective.
PureVPN also offers a dedicated Support Center with a nice design and informative knowledge base, but IPVanish has its Help page, too, with several options to fix your problems.
All in all, there used to be lots of complaints regarding support in both cases. However, this trend seems to have faded in the past. It’s quite possible that, in the end, it will be the price that decides the winner of the PureVPN vs IPVanish battle since they have been competing head to head so far.
Pricing
First and foremost, IPVanish no longer supports anonymous payment methods like Bitcoin while PureVPN offers dozens of methods, including cryptocurrencies, gift cards, and PaymentWall.
But this is not the only reason why we believe that, in this case, PureVPN is the absolute winner of this round. How about the 31-day money-back guarantee as opposed to the 7 days IPVanish offers?
And, we haven’t even mentioned the real pro for PureVPN, which is its prices. Considering the price plans, this VPN may be the better value for your money. So, who is the real winner of the PureVPN vs IPVanish comparison in the end?
IPVanish vs PureVPN – which is better?
This has been a relatively balanced battle from beginning to end. Do you agree? Still, we cannot finish our PureVPN vs IPVanish comparison without announcing a winner, right? Or, can we?
Well, all things considered, we must admit that this is a really tough decision. If it hadn’t been for the improvements of the past month in the case of PureVPN, we would easily choose IPVanish as the winner of this battle. But now, we are not so sure.
It would be great to have yet another aspect to help us with the decision. But, is there?
Hell, yeah, there is! So, how about 10 simultaneous connections vs 5? Yes! Now, we have a winner: Ladies and Gentlemen, it’s IPVanish.
We do appreciate all the great effort PureVPN has been putting in its privacy tool to catch up with the leaders and we would even “risk” saying that these two VPN services are just as good as the other.
The only question now is:
What are your needs?
If your budget cannot afford IPVanish, you may be just as safe with choosing PureVPN. If your main reason for a VPN protection is torrenting, you may rather go for IPVanish.
Do you need further information to assist with your decision?
Read our full reviews:
I have to say that PureVPN is not all bad. I have been using it for the past 6 months now; although I agree that I do not use for torrenting, it has been a good choice so far. So, I think it depends on your usage.
The phrase “More or less” concerns me when it comes to a VPN. These are decent alternatives but I can’t envision any time I’d want to use them except if NordVPN and ExpressVPN were to go out of business. Just too many issues here to take either one seriously. Good review and nice point about misleading marketing techniques.
Both of these VPNs offer some outstanding features. But, PureVPN is one step ahead of IPVanish in many aspects.
PureVPN has better customer support, extensive server coverage and more payment methods. The only thing IPVanish has going for itself is speed. However, speed is a big aspect of a VPN’s overall performance.
Both are equally matched when it comes to security features. But all things considered, PureVPN can be declared a winner in a contest of two top class VPNs.
Both VPN are interesting and can meet our service expectations. While I would not prefer PureVPN over IPVanish is because they both share equal set of privacy features. This is what protects our identity when online. While it may be difficult to prefer one over the other, I may skew towards IPVanish
Like Kelly said, I also read some bad reviews about PureVPN on Reddit. But after reading this it turns out that it’s really not that bad. I’ll keep reading more information online in order to make a decision.
Hey, 12345T, thanks for your comment! You don’t have to scour the internet for more info on PureVPN! We have a comprehensive PureVPN review right here – take a look, it might help make your decision easier.
PureVPN has a somewhat confusing reputation on Reddit. What we mean by that is, many Redditors have praised the VPN service, but some have also experienced its downside. Overall, one of the reasons why PureVPN is popular among Redditors is because of the value for money it provides.