Hide.me VPN Review
This Hide.me VPN review will answer most of your questions regarding this VPN.
We aim to provide the best reviews to help you determine the best VPN in the market today.
Is Hide.me The Best VPN?
Hide.me has a free plan that is said to be the most secured among its competitors. This is a little interesting that is why we test this VPN out based on several factors.
Hide.me is a user-friendly VPN that provides good speed, and access to most of the streaming apps that we tried. Although its paid plans are a little more expensive than others, because we can still have better deals with pretty much the same or better features than Hide.me
This VPN is based in Malaysia with almost 2000 available servers on paid plans.
We notice that there are a lot of lacking features for the free plan, but overall, it is worth checking out.
Pricing
Hide.me offers 3 paid plans which are all good deals.
See the details below:
Hide.me Free Trial
This VPN offers both a free trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee for its paid plans.
How to Install Hide.me VPN on Firestick
1. Click Home on your remote and scroll once to your left. It will be the search icon.
2. You can either say Hide Me to your Alexa’s voice-enabled remote or start typing it. If you typed it, click on the suggestion when it appears.
3. Click on the Hide Me icon.
4. Click Get to Download.
5. Click Open
6. Input your username and password to log in.
Hide.me Speed Test
Speed is very much important in every VPN test. It is only natural that the download speed decreases when you connect to a VPN. This is because of the encryption and authentication happening. Just make sure that it is still good and acceptable.
Hide.me is definitely up there when it comes to speed. Both free and paid plans show a decent amount of speed. Clocking in speeds of 60MBps+ on most of its servers, it even performed much better than most VPN providers when it came to far-flung servers in Asia.
Though this should come as no surprise considering the company is based in Malaysia.
Pros
- + Split Tunneling
- + Stealth Guard
- + Free VPN
- + No log policy
- + Lets you choose your own security protocol
Cons
- – Chat Only for Customer Support
- – Free Plan can’t access BBC Iplayer or Netflix
Hide.me VPN Review – Client User Interface
Privacy /Anonymity
No-Log Policy
Hide.me follows the no-log policy. They do not store, record, or log any information, or data of the user.
This is important as we can say that they really value the privacy of the users.
Mask Your IP Address
Hide.me VPN hides your real IP address. Your IP address serves as your identity online. The traffic you acquire while doing online activities will reflect back to your IP address. So by hiding and providing a new one, your identity is really secured.
Security
In this Hide.me VPN review, we also check the VPN protocols that Hide.me is using for security.
Hide.me VPN uses AES-256 bit encryption. This is the standard VPN encryption that most brands are using. With the help of other protocols, they work with authentication.
Hide.me VPN lets you choose the protocol you want to. It is better if you know the best one for the device you are using.
The automatic feature will determine the best one for your device.
IKEv2
According to Hide.me, this is their most recommended VPN protocol. It is said to be the fastest and most secure protocol they got.
IKEv2 is best also for authentication and encryption. It makes you still connected to your VPN even if you change your wifi network to another or to cellular data.
OpenVPN
This is the standard VPN protocol for almost all brands. It has two types. UDP is relatively faster and best for streaming, while TCP is a little slower but better for network connections.
SoftEther VPN
Only a few VPNs use this protocol. Gladly, Hide.me is one of them. Although it is best used for bypassing firewalls, we still find Hide.me not that good even with the Great Wall of China, which is basically the firewall of the country.
WireGuard
Amazingly, Hide.me supports the use of WireGuard protocol. It is said to be the fastest protocol in the market today.
SSTP
Another VPN protocol that bypasses firewalls is SSTP. Hide.me really targets the use of VPN protocols that can secure user identity while accessing hugh risk countries like China, and the UAE.
Does It Work Well With Popular Streaming Apps
In this Hide.me review, we also test it out on different apps like Kodi, Netflix, and Hulu.
Amazingly, it can unblock some apps, but not all. Here’s what we found out:
Kodi
Hide.me is a P2P-friendly VPN. Although, this is better for torreting, Hide.me is perfect also for Kodi.
The UK is one of the countries that do not permit the use of Kodi. If you live in the UK, you can use a VPN to have access to this app.
I could say that Hide.me is not the best for Kodi users, especially the free plan. We recommend using other VPNs for Kodi.
Netflix
Hide.me was not also that good with Netflix. Especially if you are using the free plan, you cannot access or unblock Netflix. But with the paid plans, you can access US Netflix and other countries. You can also access four international Netflix libraries: Italy, UK, Germany, and France.
Hulu
Hide.me VPN can access Hulu and other apps like HBO Max, BBC iPlayer, and Amazon Prime.
Jurisdiction
This VPN is based in Malaysia which is a privacy-friendly jurisdiction, also known as Privacy Haven.
GeoIP Unblocking
Hide.me might not be the best for GeoIP unblocking, but it is surely a reliable VPN that can access some, if not all, geo-restrictions for some apps.
Servers and Server Locations
Hide.me offers different server programs on its free and paid services. With the paid services, it provides about 2000 servers worldwide, while the number for the free plan is not disclosed.
The countries it offers for paid services is around 46 while only 4 for the free plan.
Apps
Hide.me VPN is available on Windows, Android, Amazon Firestick, MAC, Linux, iOS, and routers.
Kill Switch
Hide.me has a kill switch feature. It is activated when your VPN malfunction. This will disconnect you from your local internet connection. Kill switch is important because, if you are torrenting, for example, your traffic won’t be recorded to your original IP.
We test Hide.me’s kill switch, and it was not that impressive. Sometimes it works well, and sometimes it does not.
The VPN will tell you that the kill switch is not performing at the moment.
Split Tunneling
Hide.me also has a split tunneling feature. This feature of Hide.me is applicable mostly to Android devices. This is very helpful because some apps can determine that you are using a VPN. Through the use of split tunneling, apps won’t be able to know that you are using a VPN.
DNS Leak
What’s good about Hide.me is that it has an IPV4/IPV6 Leak Blocking that hinders WebRTC leaks.
We also test Hide.me and there are no DNS and IP leaks recorded.
Data and information are safe with Hide.me.
Torrent Policy
Hide.me permits torrenting on both free and paid services. It is P2P friendly which is one of the key factors while torrenting. All of its offered servers supports P2P.
Tor Compatibility
There is nothing stopping you from using The Onion, but Hide.me offers a cool stealth function we have seen offered by a few other VPN providers.
This is essentially bouncing your connection through 2 VPNs and completely obfuscating your home IP.
A cool feature, and better to use this than Tor if you want to do anything faster than browsing the dark web.
Shadowsocks
Shadowsocks is Hide.me’s official SOCKS Proxy feature. It is an advanced feature that can make P2P connections faster. This is great for torrenting as well.
Stealth Guard
Hide.me also has a Stealth Guard feature. Through this, you can choose apps that won’t operate unless you are using a VPN.
It is also helpful because it can prevent you from using any app that can compromise your privacy if not using a VPN.
Customer Support
Hide.me has 24/7 live chat support. Most times it was helpful even if you are just using the free plan.
However, you can also raise your concerns through email.
Final Thoughts
Overall, we think that Hide.me is worth the shot. Despite having some downside, it still manages to do good on some of our tests. Plus it has some great additional features and protocols.
The customer support is reliable which is great.
We just think that the free plan is so limited compared with the paid plan. Also, there are other VPNs with so much more features that are less expensive.