Surfshark

Surfshark was founded in 2018 in the British Virgin Islands and was acquired by Nord Security (NordVPN’s parent company) in 2022. The service has established itself as the leading budget-tier premium VPN, combining competitive pricing with performance that competes with more expensive alternatives. The product’s primary differentiator is unlimited simultaneous device connections on a single subscription. While NordVPN limits to 10 devices and ExpressVPN limits to 10-14 depending on plan, Surfshark places no connection limit. A household with 5 family members each using 3 devices — laptops, phones, and tablets — can cover all 15 devices on one Surfshark subscription. The Starter plan at $1.99 per month on a 2-year plan is the lowest price available from a premium VPN provider that has passed independent audits. The service supports WireGuard, OpenVPN, and IKEv2 protocols, operates a RAM-only server infrastructure (no data written to disk), and has maintained a no-logs policy verified by independent audit. The One plan at $2.49 per month on 2-year adds antivirus, real-time breach monitoring, and a private search engine. The One+ plan adds Incogni, Surfshark’s data removal service that requests personal data deletion from people-search sites and data brokers. Renewal pricing is a concern. The introductory 2-year rate renews at higher rates after the first term. Where Surfshark falls slightly short of NordVPN is raw server count (3,200+ vs 9,300+) and independent audit history. Surfshark is the right VPN for price-sensitive users, large households, and anyone who wants to protect multiple devices on a single subscription without paying per device.