70 out of 100, built from two weighted parts
App store ratings, part of the score
4.683.55
Researched Oct 3, 2026Claims checked: 24Separate source groups: 8Scores updated Oct 8, 2026
TunnelBear has published independent Cure53 security assessments since 2016, including full reports for 2020 to 2023, but those are security audits rather than a no-logs audit, streaming support is limited and McAfee ownership gives privacy-conscious users pause.
How the 70 is built
Points per criterionSee the evidenceClaims checked: 24Separate source groups: 8
Case-by-case refunds
8of 15 ptsSolid EverydaySpeeds
Ranked #17 of 22 VPNs for speed in our Speed Lab.
TunnelBear ranked #17 of 22 providers in our speed rankings, built from published third-party test results.
8of 10 ptsA CapableServer Network
5,000+ servers across 47 countries.
One of the largest VPN networks globally with 5,000+ servers in 47 countries. TunnelBear offers extensive coverage and specialty servers for P2P, streaming, and obfuscation.
47 countries · Unlimited simultaneous devices · P2P & streaming servers
10of 15 ptsSolid CoreSecurity
Solid security, with a caveat or two.
Room to improve in Security (Partial Audit).
TunnelBear has published results of independent Cure53 security assessments since 2016, with full Cure53 reports public for 2020 to 2023. The findings were not always clean: Cure53's 2021 and 2022 assessments each recorded Critical issues.
3of 10 ptsReliable forMost Platforms
Streaming is hit and miss.
Streaming support is limited compared to top competitors.
Streaming is not TunnelBear's strength. Netflix access is inconsistent, and the provider does not advertise dedicated streaming servers or SmartDNS technology.
#1of 22The Easiestto Use We Rank
Easy on every device you own.
TunnelBear excels across the board here, scoring 10/10 for Devices and 10/10 for Connections.
TunnelBear is consistently praised as the most beginner-friendly VPN on the market. Its bear-themed UI, simple map-based server selection, and minimal settings make it accessible to anyone.
21of 30 ptsA SolidTrack Record
Good value, with some trust caveats.
Room to improve in Money-Back (No guarantee).
TunnelBear offers a free tier with 2GB monthly data, making it unique among major VPN providers. Paid plans scale to unlimited data with the 3-year plan offering the best rate.
Same plan, same features. The only difference is the renewal term. Pay for 3 years up front and the rate drops from $10.99 to about $3.33 a month: 70% off, roughly $276 saved over the term.
All plans and add-ons
Pick a billing period and compare every tier side by side.
Best for Casual users who need light VPN coverage
Best for Everyday users who want unlimited data and published security audits
Best for Small teams that need centralized VPN management
A plain-language breakdown of everything in the plans above: what each feature is, who it helps, and whether it is worth paying for.
All plans include:
TunnelBear has published the results of independent Cure53 security audits since 2016, and the full reports for 2020 to 2023 are public. These are security assessments, not a no-logs audit, and TunnelBear says it completed further audits in 2024 and 2025 that we could not check against a public report.
The service trades raw power for accessibility. Bear-themed animations, a visual map interface, and a 2 GB/month free tier make it the easiest VPN for first-time users. TunnelBear prioritizes trust verification and simplicity over advanced features like streaming optimization or massive server networks.
That focus comes with real limitations. McAfee acquired TunnelBear in 2018. The company operates under Canadian jurisdiction, placing it inside the Five Eyes intelligence alliance. A trust score of 70/100 reflects genuine strengths weighed against structural concerns that matter for certain users.
TunnelBear was recorded at 420 Mbps in published third-party testing, ranking 17th out of 22 providers. Latency measured 65 ms. These numbers tell a specific story: adequate for most daily tasks, but not competitive for speed-sensitive work.
Browsing, email, and standard video calls run without noticeable slowdown. 420 Mbps handles 4K streaming on a single device with room to spare. Problems surface when multiple devices share a connection or when you need consistently low latency for gaming.
The 65 ms latency sits above the threshold where competitive gamers notice input lag. Players in fast-paced multiplayer titles should expect a disadvantage compared to providers delivering under 30 ms. Casual gaming works fine.
TunnelBear supports OpenVPN and IKEv2 across its apps. WireGuard is absent from the protocol lineup. This matters because WireGuard typically delivers 15-30% better speeds than OpenVPN on the same connection. The lack of WireGuard partially explains the mid-tier speed results.
GhostBear, the built-in obfuscation mode, reduces speeds further. Expect a 20-40% drop when GhostBear is active. Users in restrictive networks who need obfuscation should account for this overhead.
The Cure53 audit record is TunnelBear’s strongest trust signal. Cure53 has published security assessments of TunnelBear since 2016, covering apps, infrastructure and backend systems, and the full reports for 2020 to 2023 can be read in full. They also record real findings: the 2023 assessment found 13 issues, none Critical and two High.
These are security audits, not a logging audit. We found no independent attestation that TunnelBear keeps no logs, so its no-logs claim rests on TunnelBear’s own privacy policy. Do not read the Cure53 reports as a verified no-logs finding.
Encryption uses AES-256 across all connections. The kill switch, called VigilantBear, blocks all traffic if the VPN drops. It works on Windows, macOS, and Android. iOS implementation has historically been less reliable due to Apple’s platform restrictions.
Canada’s Five Eyes membership is a structural concern. Canadian law permits intelligence sharing with the US, UK, Australia, and New Zealand. For journalists, activists, or anyone facing state-level threats, this jurisdiction introduces risk that audits cannot fully offset. A security audit does not prevent a future legal compulsion to start logging.
McAfee ownership adds a second layer of concern. TunnelBear is owned by McAfee, a US company, and operates from Toronto, Canada. The Cure53 reports show how the apps and infrastructure were tested, but they cannot tell you how TunnelBear will be run in future. Whether that is sufficient depends on your personal threat model.
TunnelBear operates 5,000+ servers across 47 countries. The network is smaller than leaders like ExpressVPN or NordVPN, which cover 90+ countries. Users needing servers in Africa, the Middle East, or parts of South America will find gaps.
Streaming is TunnelBear’s weakest category. The service does not operate dedicated streaming servers. It does not offer SmartDNS. There is no optimization for any specific platform.
Netflix access is unreliable. Some server locations work intermittently. Others fail outright. The experience changes session to session with no predictable pattern. Users who need consistent Netflix accessing should look at providers that maintain dedicated streaming infrastructure.
Disney+, BBC iPlayer, and Hulu show similar inconsistency. TunnelBear does not market itself as a streaming VPN, and the results confirm that positioning. If streaming drives your VPN purchase, TunnelBear is the wrong choice.
Basic geo-restriction bypassing for less aggressive platforms may work. Smaller regional services with weaker VPN detection sometimes cooperate. Treat any streaming success as a bonus, not a feature.
TunnelBear offers apps for Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android. Browser extensions cover Chrome and Firefox. There is no native Linux app, though manual OpenVPN configuration works.
Paid plans include unlimited simultaneous connections. This is genuinely generous. Most competitors cap connections between 5 and 10 devices. Families or users with many devices benefit directly from this policy.
The free tier also supports unlimited devices but caps total data at 2 GB per month. That 2 GB is shared across all connected devices, not per device. It works as a test drive but not as a daily solution.
App design reflects TunnelBear’s accessibility focus. The interface centers on a world map with animated bears. Server selection is visual and intuitive. Advanced options are minimal. Power users who want per-app split tunneling, custom DNS, or multi-hop routing will not find those features here.
Router-level installation is not officially supported. TunnelBear does not sell or configure pre-flashed routers. Users who want whole-network VPN coverage need a provider with router firmware support.
TunnelBear fits one audience exceptionally well: non-technical users who want a simple VPN from a provider that publishes its security audits. The combination of public Cure53 reports and a genuinely simple interface makes it the strongest recommendation for a parent, partner, or friend who has never used a VPN.
The free tier adds value for cautious buyers. 2 GB per month lets you test every feature before spending money. No credit card is required. The case-by-case refund policy on paid plans makes this free trial more important than usual since there is no standard money-back guarantee.
Users in mildly restrictive networks benefit from GhostBear obfuscation. It is not built for bypassing China’s Great Firewall consistently, but it handles corporate firewalls and lighter censorship regimes.
TunnelBear is the wrong choice for several specific groups. Streamers need a provider with dedicated media servers. Gamers need lower latency than 65 ms. Privacy-critical users facing state-level threats should avoid Five Eyes jurisdictions entirely. Power users who want WireGuard, split tunneling, or multi-hop will find the feature set too limited. Speed-focused users should look at providers in the top 10, not 17th of 22.
Charts and reference images from our research, free to view and share.
It’s a legitimate concern for high-risk users. TunnelBear operates under Canadian law, which permits intelligence sharing with the US, UK, Australia, and New Zealand as part of the Five Eyes alliance, and McAfee has owned the service since 2018 despite its own history of privacy controversies. Cure53’s published security audits offset some of this, but they are not a no-logs audit.
TunnelBear has published results of independent Cure53 security audits since 2016, and the full Cure53 reports for 2020 to 2023 are public. They assess apps, infrastructure and backend systems and record real findings, including 13 issues in 2023, none Critical and two High. They are security audits, not a no-logs audit, so they do not independently verify TunnelBear’s no-logs claim. TunnelBear says it also completed audits in 2024 and 2025, but we found no public report for those.
TunnelBear ranks #17 of 22 in our Speed Lab, aggregated from published third-party tests, placing it mid-tier rather than competitive. That’s fine for browsing, email, and single-device 4K streaming, but multi-device households and gamers may notice slowdown. TunnelBear runs OpenVPN and IKEv2 rather than WireGuard, and WireGuard typically outperforms OpenVPN by 15 to 30 percent, partly explaining the ranking.
Not reliably. TunnelBear has no dedicated streaming servers and no SmartDNS technology, so Netflix access is inconsistent, working on some servers and failing on others in the same session. Disney+, BBC iPlayer, and Hulu show similar unpredictability. If streaming drives your purchase, a provider with dedicated media infrastructure is the safer bet.
TunnelBear’s free tier allows unlimited simultaneous devices but caps total data at 2 GB per month shared across every connection, with no credit card required. The paid Unlimited plan removes that data cap entirely and starts from $3.33/month on its longest 3-year term. Treat the free tier as a test drive, not a daily driver.
No standard guarantee exists. TunnelBear handles refunds on paid plans case-by-case rather than through a fixed window, unlike competitors with automatic 30-day policies. That makes the 2 GB free tier especially valuable, since it lets you test VigilantBear’s kill switch and GhostBear obfuscation before spending anything on a paid term.
TunnelBear’s paid Unlimited plan starts from $3.33/month on its longest 3-year term, removing the free tier’s 2 GB monthly cap and adding GhostBear obfuscation plus unlimited simultaneous devices. Because refunds are case-by-case with no standard guarantee, running the free tier first is the more reliable way to confirm it fits before committing to a longer plan.
TunnelBear allows unlimited simultaneous device connections on paid plans, a genuinely generous policy compared to competitors that typically cap between 5 and 10 devices. The free tier also permits unlimited devices, though its 2 GB monthly data allowance is shared across every connected device rather than allotted separately to each one.
TunnelBear’s apps run on OpenVPN and IKEv2 instead of WireGuard, a gap that partly explains its #17-of-22 Speed Lab placement since WireGuard typically delivers 15 to 30 percent faster speeds on the same connection. Power users who specifically want WireGuard’s lean, fast codebase or multi-hop routing will need to look at a different provider.
Connect to a server, then disable Wi-Fi or unplug ethernet mid-session; VigilantBear should cut all traffic entirely rather than fail open to your unprotected connection. This works reliably on Windows, macOS, and Android, but iOS implementation has historically been less consistent due to Apple’s platform restrictions, so test it specifically if you’re on an iPhone.
That’s expected overhead. GhostBear, TunnelBear’s built-in obfuscation mode that disguises VPN traffic to help it pass restrictive networks, reduces speeds by roughly 20 to 40 percent when active. If you’re on an open network and don’t need to evade detection, turn GhostBear off to recover that loss; reserve it for corporate firewalls or lighter censorship regimes.
Only through SplitBear, which is limited to Android and lets you route specific apps outside the VPN tunnel while everything else stays protected. Windows, macOS, and iOS users won’t find split tunneling, multi-hop, or custom DNS options, since TunnelBear intentionally keeps its settings minimal to stay accessible for non-technical users.
GhostBear can help pass corporate firewalls and lighter censorship regimes, but it isn’t built to consistently defeat China’s Great Firewall. Users facing heavy state-level filtering or needing guaranteed access should treat any success as a bonus rather than a reliable outcome, and consider a provider with purpose-built stealth infrastructure instead.
Cure53 has assessed TunnelBear for each year from 2016 to 2023 and published its findings. Critical findings by assessment were 3 in 2016, none in 2017, 2 in 2018, 2 in 2019, none in 2020, 3 in 2021, 2 in 2022 and none in 2023; the 2019 report concluded the security posture was sound and generally solid.
After undergoing the first challenging security test which ended with several critical & high severity findings, the TunnelBear team seems to have redoubled efforts on security.Experts discovered that the browser extension VPN could easily be turned off by getting the targeted user to access a specially crafted webpage.Cure53, a respected security company, to do a complete audit of our servers, apps and infrastructure.All in all, the security at TunnelBear has once again improved by leaps and bounds.they discovered 2 “critical”, 5 “high”, 3 "medium", 7 "low", and a few "informational" issues - all of which were promptly fixed.the security posture of the tested TunnelBear components is sound and generally solid.In total, Cure53 found 2 Critical, 4 High, 1 Medium, 2 Low and 3 Informational issues-which were all fixed promptly.The testing team was unable to spot Critical issues during this 2020 exercise. Only one flaw was graded as a High risk, while the remaining problems were located in the realm of Medium and lower severity scores.after 40 days of testing, Cure53 found two low, two medium and one high-risk vulnerability.The Critical-assigned issues have increased in addition, with three unearthed during this report. Similarly, the volume of High severity-rated issues (also three) has risen in comparison with previous engagements.Cure53 found four low, nine medium, three high, and three critical-risk vulnerabilities.The fact that two Critical ranked vulnerabilities and eight High severity issues were unveiled during this assessment compounds this worrisome viewpoint.Upon completion of their audit, Cure53 flagged a total 32 issues.some flaws located in prior audits have either been incorrectly resolved or simply ignored, which are all congregated in ticket TB-11-005.Specifically, Cure53 reported a total of 6 informational/low-risk issues, 5 medium-risk issues, 2 high-risk issues, and 0 critical-risk issues.In 2022 Cure53 found 32 issues in TunnelBear, including 2 Critical and 8 High, among them exposure of cloud-account credentials from a VPN server and a full disclosure of Ansible Vault secrets. The 2021 report flagged findings from earlier audits as unmitigated, and the 2023 report noted that some earlier flaws had been incorrectly resolved or simply ignored.
The Critical-assigned issues have increased in addition, with three unearthed during this report. Similarly, the volume of High severity-rated issues (also three) has risen in comparison with previous engagements.Cure53 found four low, nine medium, three high, and three critical-risk vulnerabilities.The fact that two Critical ranked vulnerabilities and eight High severity issues were unveiled during this assessment compounds this worrisome viewpoint.Upon completion of their audit, Cure53 flagged a total 32 issues.some flaws located in prior audits have either been incorrectly resolved or simply ignored, which are all congregated in ticket TB-11-005.Specifically, Cure53 reported a total of 6 informational/low-risk issues, 5 medium-risk issues, 2 high-risk issues, and 0 critical-risk issues.TunnelBear publishes transparency reports (2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 to 2023) and write-ups of its annual Cure53 audits, with full auditor reports through 2023; no transparency report after November 2023 was found.
It's been some time since our last Transparency Report in 2021.Pentest-Report TunnelBear VPN Clients & Servers 10-11.2023McAfee announced the acquisition of TunnelBear on 8 March 2018; TunnelBear says it became TunnelBear LLC, part of a US company, while its offices remain in Toronto. TunnelBear says it holds personal data only in Canada under Canadian law, is owned by a US company and must comply with valid subpoenas, and argues that jurisdiction matters less than having no data to hand over.
Security giant McAfee is acquiring Canadian VPN provider TunnelBear. Terms of the deal haven’t been disclosed.But TunnelBear is based in Canada, which could be an issue if you’re trying to avoid intelligence services.As TunnelBear LLC, we are now part of a security company based in the United States, but our offices are still located in Toronto.Since TunnelBear is located in Canada, we have to obey Canadian data laws. If we receive a subpoena, we’re obligated to respond and cooperate to the best of our ability.Published speed results and expert reviews for every major VPN.
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