Private Internet Access vs PureVPN

Both of these sell on price and both have had their no-logs claim meet a real legal demand. The outcomes went opposite ways, which makes this an unusually clean comparison for two products that look similar on a pricing page.

Asked in court, and what came back

Private Internet Access has been asked for customer records more than once and produced nothing each time, because there was nothing to produce. In 2017 PureVPN supplied a customer's connection records to the FBI while advertising a no-logs policy.

PureVPN's answer since has been assessments, four of them, the most recent in February 2023 — and the pages describing it no longer name the firm that carried it out, which makes it harder to weigh rather than easier. Its current policy does name the specific record categories it says it does not keep, which is more precise than most.

Private Internet Access also publishes every app's source on every platform, so its behaviour can be checked outside the company, and Deloitte has inspected the servers three times, most recently October 2025. PureVPN's clients are closed and its servers do not run from memory.

What each price actually buys

PureVPN's low rate covers twenty-seven months, with port forwarding and a dedicated address sold on top. Private Internet Access renews its three-year plan at the rate it charged and includes port forwarding.

Private Internet Access has no cap on simultaneous devices where PureVPN allows ten, and adds multi-hop and a SOCKS5 proxy, which PureVPN lacks. PureVPN answers with streaming support and apps down to Apple TV and Fire TV.

The gaps run both ways in two places. Private Internet Access's kill switch allowed traffic through after a restart under testing; PureVPN's holds. And jurisdiction favours PureVPN — a British Virgin Islands company outside every intelligence agreement, against a Denver company inside the five-country one, owned by Kape Technologies which sells two other VPNs as separate brands.

PureVPN's speed has not been measured on the bench the other entries use; the figure available puts it around a fifth slower.

Which should you choose?

Choose Private Internet Access if a claim tested in court and readable source outweigh a United States address, and you will check the kill switch after a reboot. Choose PureVPN only if the prepaid price is decisive and you have read the 2017 case.