IPVanish Review (2026): Prices, Renewals, 2016 Logs Case

IPVanish is a US VPN owned by Ziff Davis that competes on breadth and price. It offers unlimited devices, apps for every TV platform and 24/7 live chat. The Essential 2-year plan costs $2.19 a month, or $52.56 up front, and renews at $99.99 a year. We verified these prices on 31 October 2026. Two independent no-logs audits, in 2022 and 2025, and a quarterly transparency report stand behind the current policy.

Against that stands the most serious logging incident in our data set. In 2016, under previous owner Highwinds, IPVanish gave a subscriber’s name, email address, real IP address and connection timestamps to the US Department of Homeland Security. At the time, it advertised that it kept no logs. This review explains that history and the renewal prices, which IPVanish states in two different ways. It also covers who the service is good for. Its score, shown above, sums up the rest.

Privacy and logging

IPVanish describes itself as ‘a U.S.-based VPN owned by Ziff Davis’. Its privacy policy names Ziff Davis, Inc. at 360 Park Avenue South in New York. J2 Global Ireland Limited is its EU representative. The site footer reads ‘IPVanish, a Ziff Davis company’.

The 5 Eyes is an alliance of countries that share intelligence, and the United States is its founding member. So IPVanish gets the lowest jurisdiction score in our methodology. That puts it level with Private Internet Access (PIA) and Windscribe.

Two other facts weigh on its privacy score. First, IPVanish is not RAM-only. RAM-only servers run entirely from memory, so a restart wipes them. IPVanish says its infrastructure is ‘a combination of HDD and RAM-only’ servers. Its stated goal is a 100 percent RAM-only fleet by 2027.

Second, every payment method it accepts is linked to you: cards, PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay and Amazon Pay. There is no cash or cryptocurrency option. Jurisdiction, disk-based servers and the lack of anonymous payment hold its privacy score down in the breakdown above. They weigh more than the 2016 incident, because our methodology only deducts points for incidents in the last five years.

The current policy was updated on 18 February 2025. It states that IPVanish does not collect, monitor or log browsing activity, traffic, connection details, IP addresses, connection timestamps or DNS queries. The anonymous, aggregated performance data it does collect excludes all of those. It keeps your account email and billing data. Payment processors hold payment data for at least seven years. Optional diagnostic connection logs on your device are off by default. They reach IPVanish only if you send them to support.

Two audits have examined that policy. Leviathan Security Group’s no-traffic-logs audit was announced on 4 April 2022. It combined staff interviews, a review of configuration and documentation, server deployment procedures and test traffic. It confirmed that IPVanish complied with its privacy policy.

Schellman Compliance completed a second no-logs audit on 21 February 2025, announced on 10 April 2025. It reviewed server configurations and change management. It also reviewed the real-time abuse-detection data, which is processed in memory only. Schellman concluded that ‘no logs were retained by IPVanish’.

Customers can read both reports in the Security Reports section of the account portal. Journalists can request them by email. As with NordVPN and PIA, that means you cannot read them before you pay.

Our data record rates the 2016 incident as high severity. No other provider among the twelve we track has that rating. On 21 June 2016, under its previous owner Highwinds, IPVanish answered a summons from the US Department of Homeland Security. It handed over a subscriber’s name, email address, real IP address and VPN connection timestamps. At the time, IPVanish advertised a no-logs policy.

The disclosure surfaced in court documents that TorrentFreak reported on 5 May 2018. StackPath bought IPVanish in 2017. It said no logs or logging systems existed when it bought the company. IPVanish has since passed to Ziff Davis.

The 2016 case does not reduce the score today. Our methodology deducts points only for incidents in the last five years, and more than nine years have passed. Since then, IPVanish has changed owners twice, and two outside firms have checked its current policy.

We still give the case a prominent place in this review. It is the clearest example in the industry of a no-logs claim that was false when it was made. Only outside checks can separate a true no-logs claim from a false one. IPVanish has those checks now, and it did not have them then. If that history rules IPVanish out for you, see the alternatives below.

IPVanish publishes a detailed transparency report every quarter in its Trust Center. A transparency report shows how many requests for user data a provider received and how it answered them. IPVanish’s figures go back to October to December 2024. For July to September 2026 it lists:

• 7 government, law-enforcement and civil requests
• 0 national security letters
• 6,436 DMCA requests, which are copyright complaints
• 6,198 malicious-activity flags from abuse reports.

It provided data in zero of these cases. The earlier quarters show 13, 16, 25, 33, 53, 35 and 51 government requests, again with zero data provided. DMCA requests ranged from 7,725 to 30,881 a quarter.

There is no warrant canary. A warrant canary is a statement a provider updates regularly to show it has not received a secret government order. IPVanish is also a co-founder of the VPN Trust Initiative at the i2Coalition. This industry group publishes a set of principles for its members.

Security features

IPVanish supports WireGuard, IKEv2 and OpenVPN over UDP or TCP. These protocols are the methods its apps use to build an encrypted connection. IPVanish no longer supports the older PPTP, L2TP and IPsec protocols. OpenVPN and IKEv2 use AES-256 encryption, and WireGuard uses ChaCha20-Poly1305.

Post-quantum encryption is designed to resist attacks from future quantum computers. IPVanish does not offer it yet. Its 2024 blog post on quantum computing explains the topic but does not announce a feature. ExpressVPN, NordVPN, Mullvad and Windscribe already offer post-quantum protection.

A kill switch blocks your internet if the VPN connection drops. IPVanish has a system-level kill switch in its Windows, macOS, Android and iOS apps. A separate TV Kill Switch companion app covers Fire TV and Android TV. No kill switch is mentioned for Linux.

Split tunneling lets you choose which apps or sites use the VPN. IPVanish offers it by app on Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, Fire TV and Apple Vision Pro. It offers it by domain on Windows, macOS, iOS and visionOS. That is wider coverage than NordVPN or PIA, which both skip iOS.

Obfuscation disguises VPN traffic so that networks which block VPNs find it harder to spot. IPVanish’s version is the OpenVPN ‘Scramble’ setting on Windows, macOS, Android and Fire TV. Double Hop routes traffic through two servers.

IPVanish added a dedicated IP on 29 October 2026, two days before we checked this page. A dedicated IP is an address that only you use. It is a paid add-on in five cities: New York, London, Paris, Frankfurt and Tokyo. It works with all three protocols and in every IPVanish app. You buy and manage it in your IPVanish account portal. The launch post does not give a price, so we can’t tell you what it costs. Our report on the dedicated IP launch covers what the post leaves out.

Threat Protection is included on every plan. It is a DNS-level blocker for ads, trackers and malicious sites. Threat Protection Pro antivirus comes with the Complete and Advanced tiers.

IPVanish runs private DNS on its own servers. DNS is the system that turns website names into addresses. To prevent IPv6 leaks, the apps either block IPv6 or force it over IPv4. They block it on Android, iOS and macOS when you use WireGuard or IKEv2. On Windows a toggle forces IPv6 over IPv4, and on macOS an OpenVPN setting does the same. You can confirm the result with our IPv6 leak test.

A SOCKS5 proxy comes with every plan. None of the pages we loaded offers port forwarding. Port forwarding lets other devices connect to yours through the VPN, and torrent users need it to seed files. Its absence rules IPVanish out for seeding.

The servers page advertises 56,000+ IP addresses, 3,650+ servers and 150+ locations. It gives no country count. Our figure of 112 is the number of distinct countries and territories in its location list on 1 November 2026. That list has 152 entries. A virtual location is a server that appears to be in one country but is physically in another. IPVanish does not say whether any of its locations are virtual. It also does not say whether it owns or rents its servers.

Apps and usability

IPVanish’s setup pages cover Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, iOS, Apple Vision Pro, Apple TV and Fire TV. They also cover Android TV devices, naming the NVIDIA Shield, onn 4K, Chromecast and the Nokia Streaming Box. Routers work by manual configuration. Every plan allows unlimited devices. That and the TV Kill Switch app are why IPVanish is a regular on our Fire TV Stick shortlist.

There are no browser extensions and no Smart DNS, which is an option for devices that cannot run a VPN app. The app source code is not published, so our apps score gives IPVanish nothing for openness.

IPVanish’s streaming page lists Netflix, Hulu, ESPN+, Max, BBC iPlayer, Prime Video, Peacock and Paramount+. Max was formerly HBO Max. The page promises privacy and less throttling while you stream, not guaranteed access. Throttling is when an internet provider slows down some of your traffic. That is a more careful claim than most rivals make. We record all of these services as the provider’s documented claims. We have not yet tested streaming access. Speed is not yet tested in our lab either, so speed is left out of the score.

We have not published our own usability notes or screenshots. Those will come with the lab described on our how we test page. The feature matrix above reflects IPVanish’s official pages on 31 October 2026.

Support

IPVanish offers 24/7 live chat on every plan and phone support on the Complete and Advanced tiers. There are also email support and a help center at support.ipvanish.com. On 31 October 2026 that help center returned HTTP 403, an access-denied error, to our fetcher. So the facts on this page come from ipvanish.com itself.

Phone support is unusual in this market. Mullvad and Windscribe state that they have none. NordVPN and PIA list only live chat, email and a help center. We have not measured response times. So the support score reflects which channels exist, not how good they are.

Plans, prices and the renewal question

IPVanish sells three tiers:

• Essential is the VPN with Threat Protection, 24/7 live chat, 3 GB of eSIM data and unlimited devices.
• Complete adds next-generation antivirus and phone support.
• Advanced adds 1 TB of Livedrive cloud storage, the Secure Browser and a bonus 2 GB of eSIM data.

eSIM data is mobile data delivered to a digital SIM card in your phone.

These were the prices on 31 October 2026, listed for Essential, Complete and Advanced in that order:

• 2-year plans: $2.19, $2.79 and $3.29 a month, billed as $52.56, $66.96 and $78.96 for the first two years.
• Yearly plans: $3.89, $4.79 and $5.39 a month, billed as $46.68, $57.48 and $64.68 for the first year.
• Monthly plans: $14.99, $15.99 and $17.99, renewing monthly at the same price.

The 2-year plans carry badges reading ‘Save 85%’, ‘Save 82%’ and ‘Save 81%’. Those savings are measured against the monthly price multiplied by 24. All prices exclude tax, and there is no free tier or trial.

IPVanish states its renewal prices in two different ways. The pricing page FAQ says: ‘After that, both Yearly and 2-Year plans renew at $99.99/year (Essential), $109.99/year (Complete) or $129.99/year (Advanced). Note that 2-Year plans renew on a Yearly cycle once the first term ends.’

For Essential, that means $52.56 for two years and then $99.99 every year. That is $8.33 a month, 3.8 times the introductory rate.

The separate renewal-price page agrees for Essential, at $99.99 a year, and for Advanced, at $129.99 a year. But it lists Complete renewing at $57.48 a year after a yearly plan and $66.96 a year after a 2-year plan. Both are far below the FAQ’s $109.99. IPVanish does not explain the difference, and we could not resolve it from the official pages.

The 30-day money-back guarantee covers yearly and 2-year plans only. Cancel one of those through the Control Panel within 30 days, and the refund is returned automatically within three business days. Monthly plans are excluded, and canceling a monthly plan in the Control Panel does not start a refund. Breaking the acceptable-use policy voids the guarantee.

Our IPVanish pricing page keeps the price history for every tier and term. Its renewal fields will change if IPVanish makes its two pages agree.

The Essential 2-year plan costs about the same as PIA’s $2.03 a month for 39 months. But PIA renews at the price you paid, and IPVanish does not. The Essential monthly plan costs $14.99, the same as NordVPN’s monthly plan. It costs more than Windscribe’s $9 or Mullvad’s $5.60. Unlike those two, it comes with no refund at all.

Who it is for and who should skip it

IPVanish is a good fit for:

• households and Fire TV users who want unlimited devices and a TV kill switch
• people who want to be able to phone someone
• buyers who will take the 2-year price, mark the renewal date and decide again when it arrives.

The two audits and the transparency report make the current policy as well documented as most of the market.

Skip it if:

• you need port forwarding
• you want to pay with cash or cryptocurrency
• you want RAM-only servers today rather than in 2027
• you want to pay month to month with a refund as a safety net
• browser extensions or open-source clients matter to you
• the 2016 disclosure under Highwinds is a line you will not cross.

The ranked reviews page shows where IPVanish sits on its current score. Our best VPNs for privacy page explains why a US provider without anonymous payment does not make that list.

Alternatives

We have not yet published a head-to-head comparison for IPVanish. The comparisons hub lists the pairs that exist today. Until we add one, these are the reviews to read next.

NordVPN is the obvious upgrade for anyone comparing the two. It is based in Panama, has six no-logs engagements on record and runs RAM-only servers. It claims streaming support for the main US services and offers 24/7 live chat. Its 27-month Basic plan costs $3.49 a month, or $94.23 in total, and renews at $139.08 a year. It allows 10 devices rather than unlimited, and it has no TV kill-switch app. Our NordVPN review covers its two incidents.

Private Internet Access is the closer rival on price. It costs $2.03 a month for 39 months, which is $79 in total, and renews at $79 every three years. It offers unlimited devices, open-source apps, port forwarding and three Deloitte no-logs reviews. It is also based in the US. Our Private Internet Access review explains the Kape ownership.

Surfshark matches the unlimited-devices pitch. It operates under Dutch jurisdiction and had Deloitte no-logs audits in 2023 and 2025. Its 27-month Starter plan costs $2.49 a month, or $67.23. Its order page does not state the renewal price. See our Surfshark review.

ExpressVPN costs more: $2.99 a month on a 28-month plan, or $83.72, renewing at $99.95 a year. In return it brings British Virgin Islands jurisdiction, KPMG no-logs audits and a post-quantum protocol by default.

How we verified this review

Every price, plan term, renewal figure, refund condition, server figure and feature on this page was read from IPVanish’s official pages on 31 October 2026. The site at ipvanish.com returned an error to our automated fetcher. So we loaded the pricing, renewal-price, money-back, Trust Center, features, blog and Dedicated IP launch pages with a standard request. We then read the data from the saved HTML. The help center at support.ipvanish.com returned HTTP 403, and we did not use it.

The two audits are dated from IPVanish’s own announcements. The 2016 incident comes from the TorrentFreak report of 5 May 2018 that our data record cites. The transparency figures come from the Trust Center’s quarterly tables. We have not run speed or streaming tests. So speed is left out of the score, and every streaming entry is labeled a claim. The data record behind this page is public. The methodology page explains each score input.