Surfshark vs IPVanish

Both of these sell the same headline — every device you own, cheap — and both have something specific working against them. Which flaw you can live with is the comparison.

Unlimited devices, and the gaps behind them

Neither caps simultaneous connections. IPVanish adds first-party apps for Apple TV, Android TV and Fire TV, which Surfshark also has, but IPVanish ships no first-party Linux app at all: Linux means configuring WireGuard or OpenVPN by hand.

Surfshark's kill switch allowed traffic through after a restart under testing, and it does not support IPv6 — the guidance is to disable IPv6 on your network. IPVanish protects IPv6, which Surfshark does not. Its kill switch is no better, though: a lab found it leaking after a reboot, a crash and a dropped connection, so both of these fail the same test.

Surfshark answers with multi-hop, ad blocking, obfuscation and a fleet running from memory with nothing on disk. IPVanish has multi-hop, ad blocking and obfuscation too, but its servers write to disk rather than rebuilding on restart, and its clients are closed, so nothing outside its audit speaks to what they do.

The 2016 summons, and what it changes now

In 2016, under previous ownership, IPVanish told Homeland Security it kept no usage information and then supplied a subscriber's name, email address, home IP address and connection times. Two changes of ownership later, Schellman Compliance examined the no-logs claim in February 2025, with the report behind a customer login.

Surfshark has no such episode. Deloitte assessed its servers in June 2025 and a separate firm tested the network that December. The Netherlands is inside the fourteen-country intelligence agreement; the United States, where IPVanish is registered, is inside the five.

On price, Surfshark's rate covers twenty-seven months and roughly doubles. IPVanish charges far more for every year after the first.

Which should you choose?

Choose Surfshark if the 2016 disclosure is disqualifying and you will verify the kill switch yourself after a reboot. Choose IPVanish if you want the protective features to behave and IPv6 handled, and you accept that its history was tested once and did not hold.

Neither is comfortable. If unlimited devices is the actual requirement, Windscribe offers it with a kill switch that holds, open-source clients, and no disclosure to weigh against the price.