For Anyone Considering VPN Unlimited (KeepSolid)

This is to anyone who is considering to purchase their services, especially in light of their Lifetime service offer. I know they are always running Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals. I purchased a lifetime plan in 2016 for $19.99 for Black Friday. It still works and so far until now that has been a big plus, but there have been some HUGE changes.

Most importantly, torrenting has been all but stopped on their services. They claim that they still allow it but do not be fooled. The number of servers that allows torrenting was reduced to 3 recently (Paris, Bucharest & Ontario servers only). The biggest change, though, is the software itself: Running their VPN program has not only restricted what can access their VPN but also what can access the internet even while this software is running in the background without being connected. You can stop the VPN session, leave the program running, and it will still limit your connections to the internet with or without the kill switch engaged. This happened after a routine update. I uninstalled and reinstalled the software to no avail and even used another computer with a clean install. . I used Vuze, qBittorent and uTorrent, and none could connect to peers even when peers were trying to connect (Vuze registering a NAT problem and specifically saying the TCP/UDP ports were not open, for ever single configuration tried). I can no longer run Tor Browser with their VPN software running in the background, nor I2P, and this was not a problem until now. I’ve tried many different TCP, UDP ports, binding/not binding etc. It just blocks anything that’s not Firefox, Edge, Chrome etc, regardless of workarounds and whatever open ports you route through. I couldn’t get Windows Updater to connect even. This has been a significant and disturbing departure from the service I had reliably used (even though it wasn’t that good) for years.

Their streaming servers have had a huge change as well. Instead of having servers listed for streaming generically, they now list a specific server for each streaming service. There is one specific server for Netflix, one for Hulu, one for HBO Max etc. For the record, I have not had luck with their streaming servers in the past. They used to share the San Francisco torrent server with the streaming services and that was the one I used. Before Netflix cracked down on VPNs I was able to use this and it connected, but still obviously recognized it as a US server and gave me US content on the desktop version. It was also incredibly slow and took several minutes to buffer. The new setup for servers for specific services, just connecting to them with the web browser, shows they are all US based. My interest in using the streaming service would be for changing geographic locations for content libraries. If they are all US based, why bother even? If you don’t use any of the top streaming services ( or even the BBC iPlayer), you potentially will not be able to use their streaming service. I have not tried with the standalone apps but it doesn’t look promising and definitely won’t be fast. Which brings me to the next issue.

Speeds have considerably decreased across the servers. I ran different speed tests on sites and was getting between 98-112 kbps each time in download speeds. Their servers were never super fast but I could download a 1.5GB file in about 30-45 minutes each time. Now, I wait about a minute and a half for pages to load.

If you’re considering to get a VPN service, I know this looks enticing. Your money will be better spent elsewhere however. For $20-30 once, this service was okayish, but for anything over that, absolutely not. I guess I got my money’s worth out of it. For anyone else, I do not recommend.

Proton VPN would’ve been such a better option for you. I was also using VPN unlimited but when I switched to Proton, I never wanna go back again. Use this discount code to get a solid discount on Proton.

You’re welcome.

This is why you never buy a lifetime subscription to anything.

I am using Keepsolid lifetime since Jan 2018. I honestly can’t say I have experienced any significant decrease in performance. From time to time yes but that is ok since I don’t use it for mission critical stuff. Paid US$18 for lifetime so there is nothing I can find to complain about. On the odd ocassion I contacted customer service, they always respond in a timely manner and resolve my issues.

I do not use Keepsolid’s apps, not because they are no good, its just I find it easier to run the VPN client app (openvpn) on my router. Does the same thing.

I use VPN Unlimited and I too got the Lifetime deal, which is fantastic. I only use a VPN in limited circumstances now, such if I am concerned about DMCA notices. But that is hardly ever anymore, as I can access virtually anything through programs on Fire TV or Kodi. Using the Ontario server, I had blazing speeds depending of course on the number of seeders and their connection speeds. But I was topping 27 Mb/sec. Moreover, I repeatedly went to various websites to identify and double-check my IP address and it consistently shows an IP address in Ontario. So for $19.99 paid in 2016, I have gotten a fantastic bargain, IMHO. So for less than the price of a cocktail in Miami, I have gotten 8 years of VPN.

I’m not sure whether you’ll see this since your post was two months ago, but I’ve been using VPN Unlimited for torrenting for a few months and have never encountered any issue, except perhaps slowness now and again (though I don’t think that’s the VPN’s fault). The only servers I use regularly are Sweden, Sydney, and New Zealand.

So how am I able to do this?

I have it and it sucks totally for anything apart from occasional use. Usually the full program crashes with any update notifications. Kill switch activation and binding to torrents causes almost dialup speeds.

TLDR: Choice of servers are quite limited, speed too low and unreliable program.

That’s not exactly how you should be thinking about this.

Never expect the product to be the same for a lifetime, but take advantage of the deal in the meantime nonetheless.

5 years of VPN for $20 is an absolute steal, then move on to service that better fits your current needs once the run is over.

If I had paid $199 or whatever for the lifetime deal, I’d be angry. For $19.99 in 2016 and still being able to VPN some with it, it was too good to pass up. Ultimately, after a few months of using them for this service (especially after a year of use), I was able to determine it was not something worth paying more for. That being said, it was a nice add-on when others weren’t working and especially when I only had that VPN provider.

But yeah, lifetime anything is bound to get worse and someone else asked about this specific VPN provider yesterday. I thought I would chip in my two cents and steer them clear of this offering.

This reads like ChatGPT and your comment history is full of similar posts.

Another NordVPN bot. Literally the same message as before

Sweden, Sydney and NZ are not torrenting servers. I tried using non torrent servers through the years and they would not connect in Vuze or uTorrent (or the various others I tried). You must not be based in the US.

Most VPNs still have untested track record in court. To date, only Mullvad and AirVPN (I believe) have proven court cases for non disclosure. Price isn’t everything.

I’m in Australia. I checked and I notice on VPN Unlimited controls, the places you listed are listed under ‘torrent.’
I use qBittorrent… if it does connect and work, do I have anything to worry about? Or do those servers put me at risk if I use them to torrent?

Thanks for the help :slight_smile:

Yea and 99% of cars have never tested their airbags.

Your purchasing decisions shouldn’t be influenced by the slight possibility of the absolute worst outcome, you buy based on what is advertised and the value proposition. That’s how the real world works.

Here we go again, you really like to spread that false claim

Ok I think I know what might be happening now. You might not be binding qBittorent to the VPN. VPN Unlimited will not allow you to bind BitTorrent to their VPN, they used to allow you to bind to it when you used those 5 servers (now 3). When I first got it and didn’t know any better, I did what you were doing and just used any server for it. What I found out was that I wasn’t binding the program to the VPN and VPN Unlimited was rejecting the BitTorrent program and just allowing them to connect through my regular internet. VPN Unlimited was also notorious for disconnecting and reconnecting for me, which is when I noticed I got DMCA notices. When the kill switch came out, I started using it but BitTorrent never worked, so I started using their specified servers and it worked (slowly). It still had problems connecting and disconnecting at times and it would send traffic unprotected. That’s when I learned about binding the torrents.

Are you binding the torrents to the VPN? They could be allowing torrents to work outside of the US, but unfortunately for me they have all be closed the door for it here.

Yea and 99% of cars have never tested their airbags.

car companies do crash tests. vpn companies don’t do test court cases. not a good analogy

You’re exactly right. Gosh.

I tried binding it, and any server but those three would reject connecting to torrents. And if I entered ‘ipconfig /all’ into a command prompt that proved it. I’ve just installed Mullvad and bound it to qBittorrent and it’s much faster, too.

The reason why I was using VPNUnlimited in the first place is that a family member had bought a lifetime subscription to PureVPN years ago, but they were ending the offer (which essentially makes it a scam), and instead just pushed the account over to VPNUnlimited. Oh well, thank you so much for bringing that to my attention, I suppose I’m lucky for avoiding any notices.

Car companies do not test your specific airbag.