Tunnel Bear VPN


TunnelBear app icon, a bear popping out of a yellow pipe

I’ve been on the road a lot the last few weeks and, as happens when you travel, spent a lot of time around tempting, yet unknown, public WiFi. . So I decided to get more serious about VPN.


TunnelBear notification saying Connection secure and that the user is now browsing in private from the United States

The biggest reason (to me) to use a VPN service is security. VPN gets you a private Internet connection anywhere there is WiFi. I don’t care when I’m at home but in Starbucks I don’t want anyone to get into Internet connection. It happens. There are other advantages to VPN including the ability to spoof your country of origin, so if you want to watch a video that is available in Europe but not in the U.S., a VPN can trick it into thinking you are in Europe, or Canada, or just about anywhere else. VPNs can also cut out web trackers and other creepy advertising nonsense but like said earlier, I was primarily looking for secure browsing and Internet access while on the road.

I looked at several options and ended up signing up for Tunnel Bear. Tunnel Bear provides a reliable VPN connection with all of the above advantages and a simple interface. It’s either on or it’s off and that’s about it.


TunnelBear menu bar window with a wooden control panel showing Disconnected and the country set to United States

If you want to spoof your country, that is easy as well. I wrote this post from Ireland via Hawai’i. I love living in the future.

The Tunnel Bear pricing is also reasonable. You get 500MB per month for free (that can go up with promotions) or you can get unlimited data for $4.99 per month. If you find yourself connecting to strange WiFi, check it out.

 

Written by David Sparks

I write about getting more from your Apple gear. If this was useful, go deeper in the Labs or grab the weekly newsletter.