Ever since the VPNs came out to the light and people started learning more and more about them, there has been a question which one to use, what’s the best one, are there risks, and so on. Many of those questions have already been answered, and the answers aren’t difficult to find, but that’s only one side of the story.
It’s important to know what products are good, and if you should use them. However, it’s also important to be fully aware of the flaws of the online services as well, because if you only know half of the services characteristics, then you can’t really depend on it, since there’s always a danger of the product backfiring, and then it might be too late. With this in mind, this time we’re going to discuss the VPN provider called Tunnelbear, and try and see how dependable it really is.
If you’re looking to find other programs like Tunnelbear, but that are better, check out something like TorGuard.
TunnelBear Website And Offers
The first thing that we’re going to mention is the Tunnelbear’s website. And the first thing you notice when you go to the website is a lot of bears. It’s very easy not to take this VPN provider seriously, and that first impression mostly comes from the design itself.
When it comes to the services that Tunnelbear offers, there are three packages, one free, and two that you have to pay for. Even though it’s one of only a few VPNs to actually offer a free package, this “Little Bear” offer is very limited, since it only offers 500 MB of data per month.
This limitation isn’t very practical for the regular users, so you’d have to pay for one of two other packages, which are called “Giant Bear” and “Grizzly Bear”. The giant bear package is a monthly package, and it costs $6.99 per month, while the grizzly is an annual package which is being charged for $4.16 per month, or $49.99 per year. So, as we can see, the prices aren’t that bad, but the bad thing is that none of the packages supports torrenting, which would make it useless when it comes to encrypting your file sharing.
The TunelBear App
This VPN has one of the simplest apps you’ll ever find, and even though it’s big on aesthetics, it doesn’t provide you with many features. You can only find an on/off switch and a list of servers that you can choose from.
There is a gear-shaped button that will lead you to other options, however, there’s not much else there, except for a network kill switch called ‘Vigilant’. Despite the fact that some users find this app to be cute and charming, it does have several serious disadvantages, like its lack of DNS leak protection, the kill switch for the app itself, as well as more advanced features for more experienced and serious users.
Basically, it would only be good for those who aren’t very skilled with VPN and don’t use the internet as much, especially when it comes to the free package. Of course, as we mentioned earlier, torrenting and P2P file sharing are out in general, so it wouldn’t be very useful for that.
Other Characteristics
TunnelBear also has a mobile app, which is simple enough, just like the one for the PC version, and also, there are a lot of bears there as well. It also offers a proxy-like extension for Opera and Chrome, but unfortunately for Firefox and other users, that’s where the extension’s reach ends.
Another thing that it lacks is a live customer service or any sort of forum, so if you have a problem of any kind, you can only try and find the solution in one of their guides that can be found on the website.
The number of servers is relatively small, and the VPN only owns servers in 20 countries, which is a pretty small number, and that also means that the servers are far away from each other and most of the users, which in turn directly affects the already not-that-great speed that this VPN provides you with.
When it comes to privacy, it has a pretty decent encryption (256-bit AES encryption), as well as privacy policy, and there’s the no logging rule that’s one of the main reasons for which people even use VPNs. However, as we already mentioned, the lack of torrenting coverage is a pretty bad thing, since many users like VPNs because of the protection they provide when it comes to file sharing. Also, the app doesn’t offer any optional protocols like L2TP/IPsec, PPTP, which might be considered a big lack as well.
Conclusion
All in all, it is a pretty cute and charming app, and we love the amount of bears included in the aesthetics, however, it lacks some seriously needed features, as well as the number of servers it offers. The free package is only useful if you’re going to treat it as a trial for this provider, only remember that the bandwidth is pretty modest since it’s supposed to last for an entire month. So basically, it is not bad if you’re a beginner when it comes to using VPNs, but since the concept and features are pretty easy to grasp, we would recommend careful reconsideration.
