HideMy.Name VPN Review 2024

HidemyName-review-in-USA

Our Verdict

There are multiple aspects you can like it in the HideMy.Name VPN Review. These include native VPN apps, a free trial, reliable unblocking capabilities, average speeds, and trustworthy customer support. However, per our HideMy.name VPN review, it does offer a small network of servers and an unaudited logging policy.

HideMy.Name is a powerful and reliable VPN based in Belize City in Centro America. You may not have heard of it before because it is not very popular yet in the VPN industry. Apart from that, it is a top-notch VPN service with strong encryption, advanced protocols, and average performance.

HideMy.Name VPN Review boasts of having servers in over 45 countries which makes it very convenient for users who want to access geo-restricted websites from different parts of the world.

Why Should You Trust Us?

We have spent thousands of hours and days testing 160+ VPN services using our carefully curated testing process to recommend you the best VPN. Here are a few statistics:

  • tick_doneTotal Hours of Testing1000+
  • tick_doneWeekly Speed Tests110
  • tick_doneVPN Services Reviewed160+
  • tick_doneStreaming Platforms Tested Daily50+
  • tick_doneIP & DNS Leak Tests Performed100+
  • tick_doneHow Much we have spent on testing$30,000+


Key Findings – HideMy.Name VPN Review

While testing the provider for our HideMy.Name VPN review, we discovered the following:

  • Pricing: You can get the HideMy.Name for only $4 monthly on a yearly with a 30-day of the money-back guarantee. You can also avail of its 24-hour free trial.
  • Servers: HideMy.Name has only 140+ servers in almost 45 countries which is very limited compared to other VPNs. This leads to slower speeds and more latency when connected to servers located in far-away countries.
  • Security: In terms of security, HideMy.Name is not very advanced. It offers basic security protocols like the IKEv2 protocol. This type of encryption is good for only basic browsing but not for encrypting your traffic.
  • Privacy: HideMy.Name has a strict no-logging policy which means it does not keep track of your browsing history or any other data. This ensures that your online activities remain private from third-party agencies.
  • Speeds: The speed of HideMy.Name is not too impressive compared to other top-notch VPNs. On testing, it gave us only 55.20 Mbps of downloading speed on a connection of 100 Mbps, which is not enough even to stream HD content.
  • Streaming: HideMy.Name doesn’t offer good streaming speeds, and it can take a few minutes for HD videos to buffer. It will ruin the streaming experience due to buffering issues.
  • Torrenting: Though HideMy.Name allows torrenting on all of its servers. But the significant speed drops when torrenting make it an average VPN for P2P sharing..
  • Torrenting: Though HideMy.Name allows torrenting on all of its servers. But the significant speed drops when torrenting make it an average VPN for P2P sharing.
  • Works in China: HideMy.Name is not suitable for use in China as its technology does not work properly and can get you blocked by the Chinese government’s Great Firewall of China.
  • Installation and Apps: HideMy.Name has its own dedicated apps for all the major platforms, including Windows, Android, iOS, Linux, and macOS. The installation process is simple and straightforward and does not require any technical expertise to get started.
  • Customer Service: When it comes to customer service, HideMy.Name is not very reliable. No doubt, the support team is available 24/7 and has live chat support, but the response time is slow, and the solutions provided are not satisfactory.

HideMy.Name Features – At a Glance

Servers 140
Countries 45
Price $4 per month on a yearly plan
Free Trial 24 Hours
Simultaneous Connections 5
Speed 9.31 Mbps
Compatible Devices Android, iOS, macOS, Windows, Linux, and Routers
DNS Leaks No
Keep Logs No
Headquarters Belize City, Central America
Customer Support Yes
P2P Support Yes

Pros
  • Easy-to-use apps
  • Average speeds
  • 30-day money-back guarantee
  • 5 simultaneous connections
  • 24/7 live chat
  • Free trial

Cons
  • Doesn’t work with Netflix
  • No browser extensions
  • Small network of servers
  • Lacks multiple features
  • Outdated knowledgebase


1. Pricing

Plan Cost
Monthly $11
Six-Months $5
Yearly $4

The payment methods accepted by HideMy.Name are Credit Cards, Debit Cards, and cryptocurrencies. The most disappointing thing is that they didn’t accept the payments through Paypal.

HideMy.Name Review will show you the three different subscription plans for you. One is the monthly plan which costs $11 per month, and the other is the six-month plan which will cost you only $5.00 per month. The last one is their yearly plan, which costs only $4 per month, making it their most economical option.

hidemy.name-prices

You can choose your preferred subscription plan per your needs.

HideMy.Name offers a 30-day money-back guarantee to ensure the satisfaction of its customers. If you are not satisfied with the service, you can simply request a refund, and they will provide you with one without any hassle. But, make sure one thing that for a refund, you must use less than 5GB of their data. Moreover, if you have purchased a dedicated IP address, you will not receive a refund for it.


2. Servers

HideMy.Name has over 140+ servers located in 45 countries. This is a very small network as compared to other VPNs we tested, like ExpressVPN, which has more than 3000 servers covering almost 105 countries.

You should always choose a VPN with a larger network to ensure that you get the best speeds and connectivity. Because of HideMy.Name has a very small network; you may experience slow speeds and connectivity issues when streaming or gaming with this VPN. Moreover, if you want to unblock content from different countries, a small network can be a major hindrance.

It also doesn’t have optimized servers for gaming, P2P, and streaming purposes. This makes it difficult to get the best speeds while playing online games, downloading torrents, or streaming shows and movies.

All in all, HideMy.Name is not a great VPN for gaming, streaming, or P2P activities, as its speed test results were below par. Its small server network also doesn’t help in the matter. So, if you are looking for a VPN specifically for streaming and gaming, we suggest you look elsewhere that has optimized servers for streaming.


3. Security

The security of HideMy.Name is good, and your data will be safe while using this service. The breakdown of the security features are:

Encryption and Protocols:

HideMyName uses 256-bit AES-256-CBC encryption, which is the strongest and most secure encryption. This means that anyone trying to snoop on your traffic won’t be able to decode it, even if they have the right tools. HideMy.Name also gives you the option to change the level of your encryption. You have three opinions to choose from.

  • AES-256-CBC (most secure).
  • AES-128-CBC (Faster).
  • BF-CBC (Old and not recommended).

IP, DNS, WebRTC, and IPv6 Leaks:

Moreover, we tested HideMy.Name to see if it had any DNS or IP leaks, and it did not. You remain anonymous even when connected to the internet through this VPN.

If the VPN has any DNS or IP leaks, hackers and other third parties may be able to access your true identity and thus compromise your privacy. HideMy.Name did not have any such issues in our tests which is a plus point for this VPN service. We connected to its US server and visited ipleak.net. Following are the results that we got:

hidemy.name-ip-leak-test

This means that our original IP address was always anonymous.

Kill Switch:

You can also protect your privacy by using HideMy.Name’s kill switch if the VPN connection suddenly drops. As soon as it detects that the VPN has been disconnected, this feature will immediately break your internet connection, thus preventing accidental exposure of your device’s traffic. While testing, this feature turned out to be efficient, but it couldn’t beat the capabilities of ExpressVPN’s kill switch.

Auto-Connect:

This is another great security feature that HideMy.Name offers you. This feature automatically connects you to the best available server so that you always have the optimum speeds while connected to the internet.

This feature is very helpful for those who do not want to manually select servers every time they connect. With this feature, you can be sure that you have the most reliable connection with less server traffic.

4. Privacy

HideMy.Name has a solid no-logs policy which means that it does not keep any records of your browsing or usage history. This is great as you can be sure that no one can trace your activities back to you and, thus, maintain your online privacy.

hidemy.name-no-logs-policy

The company also offers a strict data privacy policy which states that it will not share or sell your personal information with any third party. This means that you can browse the internet without having to worry about anyone tracking your activities.


5. Speed

While doing the speed testing, we looked for the following criteria:

  • Download Speed: Download speed is the most important criterion for streaming. The faster the download speed, the better it is for streaming HD content.
  • Upload Speed: Upload speed is also crucial, as a slow upload can ruin your online gaming experience and cause lags while browsing or streaming.
  • Ping: Low ping is essential to get better response time while gaming or streaming.HideMy.name, however, had below-average performance in all of these categories.

Local Speeds:

Using our own connection without a VPN, we started our tests. We experienced a drop in download speed on the closest server that we tested, which was normal. No doubt, It is very common that download speed drops up to 15-20% when you connect a VPN, but HideMy.name had average performance here.

Our tests got off to a bad start since we got better speeds from servers near our real location. When we tried other servers in nearby countries, we found that it delivered us decent speeds.

Without VPN With VPN (US server)
speed-before-connecting-to-hidemy.name hidemy.name-speed-test-us-server

Long Distance:

Our speed tests for long-distance servers weren’t very impressive. We tested HideMy.name’s Australia server, and it gave us a download speed of only 40.36 Mbps, which is unacceptable for streaming or gaming purposes. Our upload speed also dropped significantly to 17.98 Mbps while our ping rate went up to 137ms.

Without VPN With VPN (AU server)
speed-before-connecting-to-hidemy.name hidemy.name-speed-test-au-server

Following are the results of all the speed tests we conducted:

Location Downloading Speed Uploading Speed
Canada 78.22 Mbps 33.14 Mbps
Japan 23.45 Mbps 12.45 Mbps
Germany 85.32 Mbps 60.45 Mbps
US 55.36 Mbps 7.98 Mbps
UK 55.21 Mbps 57.63 Mbps

For the best fastest VPN, choose ExpressVPN our top recommendation for unparalleled speed and reliability. Upgrade your online experience with ExpressVPN’s unmatched performance. You can check out the speeds of this VPN in our ExpressVPN speed test.


6. Streaming

If you are looking for a VPN for streaming, HideMy.name VPN should not be your first choice. YouTube was the only streaming platform that HideMy.name managed to unblock. However, most VPNs today are capable of unblocking it, so this isn’t something to brag about.

We tried a number of streaming services with HideMyName; there are some services that it was unable to unblock. But it unblocks the BBC iPlayer and Netflix. For accessing geo-restricted content, this is not the best VPN.

Hidemy.name-unblocked-netflix-us

Even though we unblocked the streaming platform, the quality wasn’t up to par.

In addition, HideMy.name lacks the SmartDNS feature as well. As a result, you will have to set up a VPN on your router if you want to watch content on a device without VPN support. The process can be a little time-consuming. However, if you are an experienced user, this shouldn’t be a problem. Instead, if you use the best streaming VPN like ExpressVPN, then you’ll definitely get a Smart DNS feature.


7. Torrenting

It is against HideMy.Name policy to torrent copyrighted files, so be sure to double-check the files you download and follow your own country’s laws. To avoid server congestion, the VPN’s torrenting policy also asks users not to leave files open after downloading. We believe this VPN is safe to torrent with due to its no-log policy and good security protocols.

But, when it comes to torrenting with HideMy.Name, our biggest concern is the server speed. With a VPN, torrenting may be safe, but downloading is pretty much impossible due to the drop in speed we experienced. This is why I recommend you get the best VPN for torrenting to get a reliable speed and security combo.

8. Does HideMy.Name Work in China?

It is very rare that HideMy.Name works in China. Because the country has very strict internet regulations, many VPNs have been blocked or have had to scramble their protocols in order to stay operational.

In our tests, HideMy.Name did not work in China due to its inability to bypass China’s Great Firewall. However, this is an ever-changing landscape, and we advise you to contact the company directly to find out if they are operational in China or not. Otherwise, the best option is to remain safe and choose the best VPN for China.


9. Installation and Apps

We divide this section into two parts as follows:

Device Compatibility:

The compatibility of HideMy.Name is quite impressive. It is compatible with almost every OS, whether it is an Android device, iOS device, macOS, Linux, and Windows.

hidemy.name-compatible-apps

For routers, you’ll find step-by-step guides on the website.

You can also set it up on the routers so that every device connected to the router can benefit from VPN protection. Moreover,  HideMy.Name also offers dedicated apps for streaming devices like Amazon Fire TV and Apple TV.

Set-Up & Installation:

The installation process for HideMy.Name is quite straightforward and easy to follow. It offers detailed guides on how to set up the VPN on various devices and platforms, making it suitable even for beginners who are new to the concept of VPNs.

You just need to select your OS from their official website, download the corresponding app and follow the instructions on the screen. The whole process should take no more than a few minutes.

For mobile devices,  you can download the app from either Google Play Store or Apple App Store.


10. Customer Support

The customer support of HideMy.Name is not so good. The only way you can contact them is through email, which can take a long time for them to respond. Furthermore, there is a live chat option available too. But, the response time is quite long, and it is not a 24/7 service.

Moreover, you can also find some troubleshooting guides on their website, but they are quite limited and do not cover all the issues that you might face with the VPN.


FAQs – HideMy.name VPN Review

Yes, HideMy.Name VPN is safe to use as it offers 256-Bit encryption, which ensures that all your data remains secure and private while browsing the internet. Moreover, its no-logs policy also ensures that your data is not tracked or stored by the company.

Yes, HideMy.Name VPN can unblock Netflix. However, the performance is not that great compared to some other premium VPNs out there. Moreover, due to the lack of dedicated servers for streaming, the speed might not be very impressive either.

Yes, HideMy.Name VPN may slow down your internet speed. We noticed a significant drop of  around 63% in our speed tests. This can be attributed to the fact that HideMy.Name is not as fast as some other VPNs. So, if speed is your priority, then you should look for a different provider.

Yes, HideMy.Name VPN offers dedicated IP addresses in certain locations. You can purchase them as an add-on to the subscription plan at an additional cost. This gives you extra privacy and security when browsing the internet, as your IP address will not be shared with any other users.


HideMy.Name Review Summary

HideMy.Name is a secure and reliable VPN with a wide selection of servers in over 45 countries. It offers 256-bit encryption to ensure the safety of your data and has a strict no-logs policy. Moreover, it also offers dedicated IP addresses which can be purchased as an add-on at an additional cost.

However, its customer support is not the best, and the speeds can be quite slow. If you are looking for a reliable VPN that offers good security, then HideMy.Name VPN is a great choice. But, if you want faster speeds, then you should look elsewhere.

You can have it for only $4 a month on a yearly plan with a 30-day of money-back guarantee.

We hope that this HideMy.Name VPN review has given you all the information you need to make an informed decision about whether or not it is a good choice for your privacy and security needs.

If you have any other questions, then feel free to ask them in the comments section below and we will be happy to help.