An honest comparison for people who actually need their VPN to work in restricted countries.
| Feature | NullVPN | NordVPN | ExpressVPN | ProtonVPN | Outline/Shadowsocks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Works in Iran | Yes ✔ | Unreliable ✘ | Unreliable ✘ | Partial | Manual setup |
| Works in Russia | Yes ✔ | Blocked ✘ | Unreliable | Partial | Manual setup |
| Works in China | Yes ✔ | Blocked ✘ | Inconsistent | Blocked ✘ | Manual setup |
| No logs (by design) | Yes ✔ | Policy only | Policy only | Policy only | Yes |
| Anonymous payment | TON crypto ✔ | Card/PayPal ✘ | Card/PayPal ✘ | Card/PayPal ✘ | Card ✘ |
| No account/email needed | Yes ✔ | Required ✘ | Required ✘ | Required ✘ | Depends |
| No app store required | Direct APK ✔ | App store ✘ | App store ✘ | App store ✘ | Varies |
| Traffic obfuscation | Deep ✔ | Obfuscated servers | Lightway | Stealth | Some |
| Auto-failover | Yes ✔ | No ✘ | No ✘ | No ✘ | No ✘ |
| Dedicated personal server | Yes ✔ | Shared ✘ | Shared ✘ | Shared ✘ | Self-hosted |
| Reachable if site blocked | Telegram + Web3 ✔ | Website only ✘ | Website only ✘ | Website only ✘ | Varies |
| Setup time | 60 seconds | 5+ min | 5+ min | 5+ min | Hours (manual) |
Consumer VPNs are designed for privacy from corporations in countries where VPNs are legal and unrestricted. They are not optimised to bypass active censorship from state-level firewalls.
NullVPN is designed from the ground up for one purpose: reliable internet access in countries where the government is actively trying to block all VPN traffic. Every design decision flows from that single goal.