On common, Proton dropped about 15 p.c of my unprotected pace, however that quantity wants some context. In a location like Atlanta, Georgia, noon on a Thursday, I skilled a drop of solely round 3 p.c. In Columbus, Ohio, within the night on a Friday, that grew to a 25 p.c drop. Any such variation is regular. Suppliers like Surfshark and NordVPN see comparable variations and have comparable pace drops on common.
The distinction for Proton is that I’ve but to encounter an actual stinker of a server. I’m positive they exist—with some 15,000+ servers, you’re sure to seek out one sooner or later—however I haven’t seen them after weeks of use. Windscribe and ExpressVPN are aggressive with Proton on common, however additionally they have some areas the place I noticed wherever from a 40 to 60 p.c drop in pace. These outcomes aren’t indicative of the pace total (you simply swap to a special server), however Proton will get you there quicker.
That edge is probably going resulting from Proton’s VPN Accelerator. I’ll admit, it appeared like nonsense. Within the Proton VPN app, you’ll discover a toggle for VPN Accelerator, which boldly claims to extend pace by as much as 400 p.c; not going. Regardless of the speedup, I don’t suppose VPN Accelerator will attain wherever close to that quoted quantity, no less than within the overwhelming majority of instances.
Nonetheless, there are some benefits, most notably, BBR. Bottleneck Bandwidth and Spherical-trip propagation time, or BBR, is a congestion management algorithm developed by Google that’s been deployed on YouTube and Google itself. Relatively than limiting packet switch when packets are misplaced, as most congestion management algorithms work, BBR fashions the community and estimates out there bandwidth. It doesn’t have to see misplaced packets to kick in.
Proton’s speeds aren’t totally attributable to BBR, however I think it helps when connecting to servers over lengthy distances. Connecting within the UK, for instance, I noticed a mean pace lack of round 20 p.c, which is way nearer to my US outcomes than it has any proper to be.
