Norton offers undeniably one of the best antivirus packages, but for our money, they have yet to have one of the best VPNs on the market But that may change now that a new upgrade has been launched with Norton VPN

Our final verdict is still to come (stay tuned for a comprehensive review coming out soon), but looking at the facts, it seems that Norton VPN has made some serious strides

For starters, Norton has updated its no-logging policy, an important part of winning the trust of any VPN; the new policy, audited in April 2024, was rated low risk by VerSprite, a cyber risk consulting firm

In addition, third-party testing conducted by Passmark revealed that Norton VPN is the fastest VPN candidate, second only to Surfshark, which has very fast download speeds In fact, in the US, Norton VPN appears to offer unrivaled fastest speeds, but we will wait for the results of our own extensive VPN testing first before making a real judgment

Note: This article has been edited to clarify the description of Norton VPN's macOS kill switch

Introduced in this new update is Mimic, an entirely new VPN protocol This protocol is designed to help obfuscate IP addresses and even hide the fact that a user is using a VPN; Mimic uses a combination of AES-256 and Post-Quantum Encryption to mimic a normal HTTPS connection, prevent websites from entering restricted mode when it detects that a VPN is being used

We have recently seen major VPN providers such as Surfshark and NordVPN offer antivirus-style protection, but the newly revived Norton VPN doesn't miss a chance to return to its roots Both a password manager and an anti-fraud tool are present

The latter sounds very similar to Nord's Threat Protection Pro, which is no bad thing When enabled, the app scans suspicious URLs, links, and images for signs of phishing scams and malware

On top of that, the VPN overhaul also includes a dark web monitoring tool that will alert you if your personal information has made its way to the dark web

Norton VPN also includes a feature that streaming fans will appreciate This means that if you want to spoof an IP address and stream region-specific content in another region, you don't have to find a designated "streaming" server Any server will do Whether the same level of unblocking as the best streaming VPNs is possible remains to be seen

If you are looking for the best iPhone VPN or the best Mac VPN, you should probably go elsewhere

Curiously, the revamped VPNs have yet to introduce a kill switch, an often non-negotiable privacy feature, to the Mac and iOS versions, even though they do on Windows and Android

Mac and iOS devices also miss the boat on encryption WireGuard, the latest and fastest encryption protocol used by the top VPNs, is only available for Windows and Android This raises the question of whether you can get such super-fast connection speeds if you are using an Apple device

Norton VPN has three subscription tiers, with different subscription levels affecting not only the features you can access, but also the number of devices on which you can install the VPN

A basic Norton Secure VPN subscription costs $4999 per year ($417 per month), covers one device, and includes the VPN itself, optimized content access, ad blocking, and four protocol options (at least Windows and Android ) are included In most cases, a single installation would not be sufficient

The mid-range Norton Ultra VPN at $10999 per year ($915 per month) is probably sufficient for most individuals It includes up to five connections and 10 GB of backup storage, plus tools for malware protection, dark web monitoring, and a password manager

Finally, the dramatically named Norton Ultra VPN Plus service costs $12999 per year ($1083 per month) Primarily family oriented, it covers 10 devices and includes 50GB of backup storage and extensive parental controls It also includes access to Privacy Monitor, an Incogni-like service that removes your name from various online databases