Buffered VPN Review 2024: A Rapidly Growing VPN with Robust Security
Buffered VPN comes to us from Gibraltar with love as stated on their website but the company is actually headquartered at Hungary. Founded as recently as 2013, it is a very young VPN service provider which offers military-grade encryption at affordable rates and 30-day refund policy. Unlimited bandwidth and server switching are some interesting features this company from Gibraltar has to offer along with a very user-friendly app. Buffered VPN is GDPR compliant and fully encrypts your traffic apart from getting rid of geological blocks to let you enjoy the internet as it was meant to be.
| Location | Gibraltar |
| No-log policy |  |
| Hiding IP | |
| Kill-switch | |
| Max connections | 5 |
| Total servers | 37 |
| Total countries | 41 |
| Compatible devices | Windows, Android, MAC, iOS, Linux, and routers |
| TOR support | |
| Torrenting | |
| Netflix | |
| Does it work in China? | |
| Servers’ speed (overall) | Average |
| Usability | Easy to use |
| Customer support | 24/7 live chat support and fast email response. Knowledgable as well |
| Website | VPN is not active anymore |
Buffered VPN was launched in 2013 with the singular goal to make the internet restriction-free for millions of users worldwide. A staunch advocate of online privacy and an uncensored internet, Buffered Limited has resolved to provide its users with industry-standard encryption to keep their data private. Buffered Limited, as listed on its website, is a from Gibraltar (a British Overseas Territory) but on further research, I found out that Buffered VPN is actually headquartered in Hungary. That should not be much of an issue for the average user as with servers in almost all major countries such as USA, UK, France, Germany, Russia, Italy, Japan, and Australia to name a few, Buffered VPN manages to deliver on its promises of fast and secure VPN connection from almost anywhere.
With Brexit looming large over Britain and much of the EU, this may be a cause for concern to some readers. In this context, it is worthwhile to mention that Gibraltar is indeed a self-governing territory and the country’s legal system acts independently of the United Kingdom to resolve legal and criminal disputes within its territory at the Supreme Court of Gibraltar.
Moving on, Buffered VPN exclusively uses OpenVPN protocol to grant you online privacy. OpenVPN protocol is much more secure than PPTP or LT2P protocols used by other VPN service provides. The military-grade algorithm, 256-bit AES encryption, used to encrypt your internet traffic does not allow even your ISP to decipher your internet traffic. AES encryption is very efficient as it does not hog memory and runs quite fast as well. Another feature that I found very useful is that Buffered VPN offers ‘Forward Secrecy’. Forward Secrecy is a Cryptographical term which means that session keys, past or present, will not be compromised if the private key of the server is somehow compromised. Buffered also always prefers Dynamic IP Address over Static IP Address as Dynamic Address offers better protection from online threats and nosy Internet Service Providers (ISPs). With Dynamic IP, your IP address changes on a regular basis which deters third parties like your ISP from keeping track of your IP address and blocking your IP address.
Buffered claims to have a Domain Name System (DNS) on every server which automatically changes your DNS settings to those on the Buffered servers. They also claim to prevent DNS leaks and not log any DNS info of the user. To ensure if Buffered VPN stays true to their words, I ran a series of DNS leak test using an online tool and each test returned positive results, as in no DNS leaks whatsoever. Not many users are aware of the extent of damage that DNS leaks can cause. DNS leaks are responsible for inadvertently giving away critical private data to third-party apps or the user’s ISP which is unwanted, to say the least.
Buffered VPN Logging Policy
Ok, this is the tricky part. Buffered VPN does not keep logs of your use yet it does. Sounds confusing? That’s because it really is. I have gone through the privacy policy and logging policy (quite vague and confusingly worded) on their website very minutely and several times too. I have gathered from several such studies that Buffered VPN does not keep a usage log but they do log technical data, they call it connection log, for the duration of your use. What it means is that while Buffered doesn’t keep tabs on what websites you visit and the frequency of your visit they, however, keep track of your ISP, IP address, location, browser type, operating system, and time zone settings among a few other such technical details most average users don’t bother about. Connection logs including when a user connects to the VPN, how often a user connects and amount of data transferred during a session. They specifically state that they do not keep a log of your internet traffic but they do store basic technical data as mentioned above, including the ones provided by you, for “as long as necessary” so that they may improve the software performance and provide you with a better service. They do not sell any private information to advertisers.
That’s why we only log data regarding the duration of your connection. We never log anything related to the content you’ve accessed.
Those are two contradictory statements side by side, as I see it. While they have highlighted the “We never log anything” portion what draws my attention is the phrase “related to the content” I have accessed. This means that Buffered VPN doesn’t track what websites I visit and what content I access but they keep a log of certain unspecified data for an unspecified period of time. You may change the data-sharing permission from the settings but it is limited to only operational error data.
Purpose limitation – this means that we will only collect your personal data for specific legitimate purposes and we will not process your personal data in a manner which would contradict those purposes” and “data minimization – this means that the personal data we collect about will be limited to what is adequate and relevant in relation to the purpose for which we have collected it.
Make of that what you will but I sincerely suggest you thoroughly go through their data and privacy policy to get things clear.
Buffered VPN: Installation and Ease of Use
Installing the Buffered VPN app is fairly straight forward and includes no hassle thanks to the very simple installation guide available on their website. Head over to the Buffered VPN website where you need to sign up. Visit the download page or click on the “Get Buffered VPN” link. Once there choose an appropriate subscription plan and then register an account. Once your account has been registered you may choose the suitable method of payment. Payment options include credit card, PayPal and bitcoins. Once you have finished you can choose the device (OS) on which you want to install the app. There are separate guides on the website for different platforms. You may consult the guides, though the process is easy enough for even the most amateur of users to breeze through.
The user interface looks minimal and sleek, but do not be fooled by looks. Under the hood are various setting options that you may adjust as per your need. Although the settings are very basic, they are enough to suffice the need of any amateur or even an average user. The homepage shows a list of all the servers according to the country they are in. Simply select a country to connect to that server and you are good to go. Once you connect a new window shows you the server you are connected to, your VPN IP address and the download/upload speeds. There are a kill switch and a disconnect button in the same window for ease of use. I give it full marks for ease of use.
Can You Access Social Networking Websites?
Yes, of course, you can access social media through Buffered VPN. Social Networking is a rage nowadays and every VPN provider makes sure that you can access your favourite social media websites without any restrictions. Some countries have strict laws and often ban social media which they see as a public dissent platform. Often countries are forced to block access to social media in times of emergency situations such as Sri Lanka did after the recent deadly incident during Easter. Buffered VPN lets you bypass such bans and protects your IP address from being tracked on social media sites. It can also show you geo-restricted contents. The major social network sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube all support Buffered VPN and the app also lets you configure certain settings on most of these sites. The app can block third-party apps and search engines outside of Facebook from viewing your profile on Facebook.
All VPN service providers claim to be the fastest VPN in the market and Buffered VPN is no exception. Buffered VPN claims ultra-fast speed, thanks to its military level encryption and worldwide servers. 37 servers are quite low compared to most of the other VPN providers we have reviewed, though Buffered VPN is still young and increasing its server count. To judge the veracity of Buffered VPN’s claim, I tested both its download and upload speed using speedtest.net. I connected to three different servers, namely UK server (London), USA server (New York) and an Asia server (Hong Kong) and all of the returned near similar results.
It is not that Buffered VPN is slow. In fact, it scored better in speed test than some VPN on our list. It is fast enough for daily use but considering the hefty price tag it bears, I expected better speed from it especially since its nearest competitors offer higher speed at lower price packs.
Exactly how popular the Buffered VPN is at this moment? A cursory look at Google Trends data helped me gauge the popularity of the VPN product. If you have ever done keyword research, I am pretty sure you already know what G-Trends is. For the uninitiated, Trends is an excellent tool that helps marketers gauge the relative popularity of a keyword, or a product, or a company. I searched with ‘Buffered VPN’ and found that the popularity of the VPN service soared around the first quarter of 2019 and the VPN service has been consistently popular since then. People are also looking for ‘Buffered VPN Review’ and ‘Buy Buffered VPN’ in good numbers.
Having used for a month or so, I can assure readers that Buffered VPN is a capable VPN service provider which takes care of your basic requirements from such a service provider. The user interface, as mentioned earlier, is lightweight and very easy to operate. The encryption is top-notch as is their always available chat support. Customer service is prompt and effective just like the app itself. The speed too should not be a big deal if you are not a professional or an online gamer. I experienced a little drop in speed after connecting to one of Buffered VPN’s server but that did not come in my way of enjoying a restriction-free, privacy ensured internet.
What concerned me the most is their poorly worded logging policy. They do not keep any usage logs but do keep connection logs. Again, this should not be a big deal for most users but for those of you on the lookout for stricter logging policy like I am, I suggest you look elsewhere. You may consider IPVanish, a similarly priced product but with more servers and stricter logging policy.
