How to speed up your VPN connection

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Sarah Tew / CNET

We’ll be early: Unless your internet provider is deliberately throttling your connection speed, using a virtual private network will slow down your internet connection. It’s the nature of how VPNs work, and there’s really no way around it. However, there are a few things that might give your VPN some speed.

VPNs add a layer of encryption to your internet connection while routing your data through a server in a remote location. This is the process that is primarily responsible for speed loss – it takes time to encrypt and decrypt your traffic, and it takes time for your data to travel to the VPN server and back. Other factors such as the VPN protocol you’re using or the load on the VPN server you’re connecting through can also affect your connection speed.

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While the speed hit can be almost unnoticeable for normal internet usage when using a fast VPN, for data-intensive activities like gaming, streaming, or video conferencing, you’ll want all the speed you can get. A delay of even a few milliseconds can mean the difference between glory and failure in your online game, and slow VPN speeds can lead to constant buffering and a heavy dose of pixels in your video stream. And if you’re using a VPN during a Zoom call, we recommend that you do everything you can to maximize the speed of your VPN to make sure the call goes smoothly and doesn’t drop out.

If your VPN isn’t as fast as you would like, here’s what you can do to speed up your VPN connection.

Read More: The Best VPNs in 2022

7 ways to improve your VPN speeds Connect to a server closer to your physical location

In general, the closer the VPN server is to your physical location, the higher your connection speed should be. Your traffic will have a shorter physical distance to cover when routed through a nearby VPN server rather than one on the other side of the world. If you’re in Boston, your VPN connection should be much faster if you connect to a VPN server in New York or Montreal rather than Sydney or Tokyo, for example.

This won’t always be practical if, for example, you want to stream content from a specific country or access a game server from a particular location. But when you need a faster connection, try connecting to a few different VPN servers near where you physically are and see which ones offer the fastest speeds. Some VPNs will have a speed test feature built into their apps, but you can always use a speed test website like Ookla Speedtest to check your connection speed.

If you’re looking for a VPN with tons of server locations, try ExpressVPN, which offers servers in 160 locations in 94 countries, so you’re bound to find some relatively close to where you are.

Connect to a server that is not overloaded

When too many people use a single VPN server, the server can get overloaded and your connection speed can take a hit. Some VPN providers display the current server load on their servers in the app itself or on the website. If you choose one with a lighter load, you will generally get faster speeds. If your VPN provider isn’t showing the current load on its servers, try connecting to a few different servers to see which one offers you the fastest speeds. Sometimes, it only takes a few trial and error.

Your VPN will lower your connection speed, but you can try to minimize that hit.

Sarah Tew / CNET Try connecting via a different VPN protocol

A VPN protocol is a set of instructions between the VPN app on your device and the VPN server that determines how the secure connection is established. There are various VPN protocols, and most providers give you the choice of a few different options. Different protocols have different advantages and disadvantages in terms of speed and security, so if you connect via one VPN protocol instead of another, you can potentially increase the speed of your VPN.

Today, the gold standard VPN protocol is OpenVPN. It is the most battle-tested protocol and offers a good combination of speed, stability, and security, which is why many VPNs use OpenVPN as their default protocol. More and more VPN providers are now also offering newer VPN protocols such as IKEv2 and WireGuard which promise faster speeds along with excellent security. And some have even developed proprietary VPN protocols like ExpressVPN’s Lightway and NordVPN’s NordLynx which claim to offer the best of both worlds.

Switching to one of these other protocols, if offered by your VPN provider, can give you faster connection speeds through your VPN. Keep in mind that while their security appears to be solid, these protocols haven’t been as thoroughly tested as OpenVPN, so they shouldn’t be your first choice for critical VPN use.

If you prefer to use OpenVPN exclusively, use UDP instead of TCP for the best speeds. Although TCP is generally the most stable option, it tends to be slower than UDP because it must send the data packets in the correct order and will wait for acknowledgment from the recipient before sending the next packet. UDP is not concerned about the order in which it sends data packets or getting any acknowledgments that they have been received, so it tends to be much faster and more efficient, but less stable.

Most VPN apps allow you to change the protocol you connect through in their settings section, so try playing around with the protocol settings to see which ones offer you the fastest speeds.

Enable split tunneling if available

If your VPN provider offers a split tunneling feature, try enabling it to see if you can boost your VPN speeds. Split tunneling allows you to send only the traffic you want over your VPN connection, while the rest is unencrypted over your regular internet connection.

For example, if you’re using your VPN for streaming, you can only allocate your streaming traffic to go through the VPN, which won’t slow down your online games. This can help optimize your VPN speeds for certain activities, because all the excess traffic you don’t need to go through your VPN won’t burden your bandwidth.

Use a wired connection

Using a wired connection will typically be faster than using Wi-Fi. Chances are you have several devices connected to your home Wi-Fi network all at the same time, devices that share and compete for resources on the same wireless channel. This can result in an unstable internet connection and therefore slower speeds. If you have the proper equipment, try establishing a wired connection by connecting your computer directly to the router via ethernet cable and then connect to your VPN.

Close unnecessary apps running in the background

If you have apps running in the background that you aren’t using, they may be taking up resources on your computer and slowing down your connection. Take a minute to check if something is running in the background that you are not using and close those processes. By eliminating potential bottlenecks like this, you may notice a faster connection.

Restart the router and other devices

When was the last time you restarted your devices? Just like anything else, technology like your computer and router occasionally needs a little R&R. When you restart your computer, you will give it a necessary update, free up some RAM and make it work optimally. So, cliché as it sounds, try turning it off and on again, then see how your VPN speeds improve accordingly.

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