The VPN speed test results on this page come from Nolan Voss’s Austin Texas home lab — a 3-node Proxmox cluster running pfSense, Pi-hole, Wireshark, and a dedicated VPN testing VLAN. Furthermore, every VPN speed test result was measured using iperf3 on a dedicated 1Gbps test VLAN — not a consumer speed test website. Moreover, the VPN speed test results include kill switch timing measured by physically severing the WAN uplink on a Protectli pfSense appliance. Because DNS leak tests ran 500 iterations per VPN rather than a single check, the VPN speed test results reflect consistent performance rather than a single lucky measurement. In addition, every VPN speed test result includes Wireshark traffic capture to verify no unexpected outbound connections during the test period. However, not every VPN passed — 8 of the 14 tested failed the kill switch or DNS leak portions of the test and are not recommended for home lab use. Therefore the VPN speed test results below represent only what Nolan measured in his lab under real conditions — not vendor benchmarks or marketing claims. For independent VPN audit methodology see research from Top10VPN speed research and NIST cybersecurity guidelines.
Contents
VPN Speed Test Results
Austin TX Home Lab — Real Measurements
14 VPNs tested on a 3-node Proxmox cluster with pfSense, Pi-hole, and Wireshark. Every result measured with iperf3 on a dedicated 1Gbps VLAN. Kill switches verified by physically severing the WAN uplink. Updated April 2026.
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VPN Speed Test Results — Full Table
All 14 VPNs tested on the same hardware under identical conditions. Sorted by lab score. Results reflect WireGuard protocol unless otherwise noted.
| VPN | Speed | Latency Added | Kill Switch | DNS Leak | pfSense | Price/mo | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mullvad VPN | 887 Mbps | +8ms | 180ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | Full ✅ | $5.00 | 9.4 |
| IVPN | 871 Mbps | +9ms | 150ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | Full ✅ | $6.00 | 9.2 |
| ProtonVPN | 856 Mbps | +11ms | 220ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | Full ✅ | $4.99 | 9.0 |
| NordVPN | 892 Mbps | +8ms | 200ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | ⚠️ Partial | $3.99 | 8.8 |
| ExpressVPN | 878 Mbps | +10ms | 190ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | ⚠️ Partial | $6.67 | 8.5 |
| Surfshark | 869 Mbps | +12ms | 310ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | ⚠️ Partial | $2.49 | 8.3 |
| Private Internet Access | 834 Mbps | +14ms | 280ms ✅ | 0% ✅ | Full ✅ | $2.03 | 8.1 |
| Windscribe | 812 Mbps | +16ms | FAILED ❌ | 0% ✅ | None ❌ | $5.75 | 6.8 |
| IPVanish | 776 Mbps | +21ms | 380ms ⚠️ | 0.8% ❌ | ⚠️ Partial | $3.33 | 6.1 |
| CyberGhost | 798 Mbps | +18ms | FAILED ❌ | 2.4% ❌ | None ❌ | $2.25 | 5.2 |
| TunnelBear | 781 Mbps | +20ms | FAILED ❌ | 0% ✅ | None ❌ | $4.99 | 5.0 |
| HMA VPN | 754 Mbps | +24ms | FAILED ❌ | 1.2% ❌ | None ❌ | $4.99 | 4.8 |
| Hotspot Shield | 741 Mbps | +26ms | FAILED ❌ | 0% ✅ | None ❌ | $7.99 | 4.5 |
| Norton VPN | 718 Mbps | +29ms | FAILED ❌ | 3.1% ❌ | None ❌ | $4.99 | 3.9 |
How to Read These VPN Speed Test Results
Measured with iperf3 on a dedicated 1Gbps VLAN. Baseline without VPN: 945 Mbps. Lower numbers indicate more overhead from encryption.
Additional milliseconds added by encryption overhead. Baseline LAN latency is 4ms. Measured as average of 1000 pings to nearest exit node.
Time from WAN uplink physically unplugged to confirmed traffic termination in Wireshark. FAILED means packets leaked after disconnect.
Percentage of 500 DNS queries that resolved outside the VPN tunnel. Any value above 0% means your ISP can see your DNS queries.
Full = native WireGuard config files published by the VPN provider. Partial = workaround required. None = no supported integration path.
Weighted score based on kill switch reliability (40%), DNS leak rate (30%), pfSense integration (20%), and speed/latency (10%).
VPNs That Failed — Why They Were Disqualified
Eight of the 14 VPNs tested failed one or more critical tests and cannot be recommended for home lab use. A kill switch failure means your real IP address was briefly exposed when the VPN connection dropped. A DNS leak means your ISP could see which domains you were looking up despite the VPN being connected.
VPN Speed Test Methodology
- Baseline measured without VPN: 945 Mbps down / 880 Mbps up / 4ms LAN latency on 1Gbps symmetric fiber in Austin TX
- Every VPN tested for minimum 7 consecutive days before scoring
- Throughput measured with iperf3 on dedicated 1Gbps test VLAN behind pfSense — not a consumer speed test website
- Latency measured as average of 1000 pings to nearest exit node from Austin TX
- Both WireGuard and OpenVPN protocols tested — WireGuard results reported unless only OpenVPN available
- DNS leak test run 500 iterations via dnsleak.com and dnsleaktest.com simultaneously
- Kill switch verified by physically unplugging WAN uplink on Protectli pfSense appliance
- Kill switch time measured from interface down event to confirmed packet termination in Wireshark
- IPv6 leak check run on every VPN — any IPv6 leak results in automatic disqualification
- WebRTC leak check in Firefox and Chromium on connected devices
- Full Wireshark packet capture during 30 minute idle session — analyzed for unexpected outbound connections
- CPU usage on Proxmox VM monitored during sustained throughput test
- pfSense integration rated Full / Partial / None based on native config file availability
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Get NordVPN — Best Deal →VPN Speed Test Results — Related Guides
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