VPN | Wang VPN |
Based In | China |
Logs | Yes |
Speed | 41 Mbps |
Network | Unknown |
Refund | NA |
Price | NA |
Website | Google Play Store |
Wang VPN, sometimes stylized as WangVPN, is an Android-only, free (ad-supported) Chinese VPN provider. The Google Play Store shows it has more than 1 million downloads, and they show a rating of 4.9 stars from more than 635k reviews. Google Play says that it offers in-app purchases, but we were not able to find any. Like some of the other competitors, its purpose is to help you get around internet censorship. That likely makes it more of a proxy than a VPN. It offers very little as far as network and features go, but we will take a closer look to see how it fares. This VPN is ad-supported, so let’s get started.
About Wang VPN
Finding information about Wang VPN is not the easiest thing to do. However, we did find out that the full name is Lao Wang VPN. It offers the main web page and a privacy policy. Of course, we translated the privacy policy into English. To summarize, they state they won’t sell your data to individuals, groups, private companies, or public agencies. However, our understanding is that they keep your data and will turn it over to the authorities. That is not surprising since the company is based in mainland China.
Wang VPN Features and Operation
At the time of this review, Wang VPN mentions in a note that the Chinese government took down the servers, so it is using “emergency servers”. You’ll notice in our images that all the servers here say emergency. We are not sure if that will continue, but some parts of the year are better than others. We can’t find any mention of encryption, or even if they use it. As far as features go, there is not much to this one. When you open the console, you’ll see that it allows you to choose the area.
In the image, you can see there are very few servers available and no indication of where they are. You can select a custom connection time with the options of 2 hours, 4 hours, or forever. The Custom App Proxy feature will let you choose the app you want to run through the VPN. That feature can be described as a split tunneling option. The only other option is the “Smart PAC” option. Allegedly, it can detect the network you want to proxy.
Is Wang VPN Fast?
To answer this question, you have to consider what you are using it for. If you are going to use it for censorship, it may be OK. That said, we tested it on a server in the closest area. As you can see in this image, our normal speed is 453 Mbps. Our Wang speed was only 41 Mbps. That represents more than a 90% speed loss. For those with lower base speeds, you’ll have issues. If you are looking for high speeds, this one misses the mark. You’ll still be able to look at web pages and short videos, but this VPN is not designed to help you stream content.
Does Wang VPN Leak? DNS Leak and Location Test
The goal of any VPN is to mask your IP address and by the same token, your location. When testing this one, we had mixed results. As you can see in this image, it shows DNS from Cloudflare, but it does not show our real IP address. When we tried the location test, you can see that we have the VPN on. That test not only showed our real location but our actual IP address as well. That is concerning, especially if you are in a country with strict internet policies. You could end up with a knock at your door in the middle of the night if you use it. That is a fail in our book. While we usually do a streaming test, but there is no need since Wang VPN didn’t place us in a different geo-location.
Customer Service
When looking at customer service, there are two options. If you have issues with the service or something that might be easy to solve, they have a Wang user group. You can access that by going through the app. If you have other questions or need support, you can send an email to Wang. As far as getting back to you quickly, we don’t have any estimation on how much time it will take. However, you get the feeling that this company is very small and likely does not have a large team behind it.
Conclusion
To wrap this review up, we can’t honestly see how Wang VPN has a 4.9-star rating in the Google Play Store. While the service is free and easy to use, the speeds for Wang VPN were only OK at best. That is true even if you opt to “Watch an ad for better server speed.” Outside of split tunneling and the option to keep it always on, this service has no features to speak of.
As far as security goes, there is no mention of encryption protocols or any levels of encryption. It quickly failed the geo-location test. Additionally, the company states that they fully comply with law enforcement. Wang VPN is located in China. If they are operating legally there, the Chinese government has the encryption keys which allows them to break any encryption the company may have. If they are operating illegally, things could quickly become problematic. We also take issue with the lack of server labeling because it is impossible to know the location of the connection server.
Overall – The lack of features, no server location clarity, and inability to test streaming services, poor privacy policy, and the location of the company make Wang VPN an abysmal choice. If you want to protect your privacy, get around censorship, and stream content from other regions, we really can’t recommend that you use Wang VPN.