If you are considering buying either CyberGhost or PIA then this is the complete CyberGhost vs PIA comparison that you need.
Even though both Private Internet Access and CyberGhost are able to deliver great connection speeds, these VPNs perform very differently along other lines like streaming and torrenting.
In this Private Internet Access vs CyberGhost comparison we are going to compare CyberGhost with PIA along the lines of their connection speeds, torrenting and streaming support among others.
I hope that by the end of this PIA vs CyberGhost comparison you’ll be able to make a choice between these two vpns.
So let’s get started.
Here is a quick summary.
| CyberGhost | Private Internet Access | |
| Website | cyberghostvpn.com | privateinternetaccess.com |
| Servers | 6,400 | 3,340 |
| Jurisdiction | Romania | United States |
| Streaming | Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, iPlayer | Netflix |
| Speed | 4.2/5 | 4.7/5 |
| Torrenting | P2P servers | All servers |
| Kill Switch | YES | YES |
| Works in China? | NO | NO |
| Devices | 7 | 10 |
| Pricing | $ 2.75/month | $ 3.33/month |
About
CyberGhost is a VPN company based in Romania that will enable you to access the internet anonymously and securely.
Here is a complete CyberGhost review.
Private Internet Access, on the other hand, is a United States based VPN service provider that will enable you to access the internet securely using some powerful malware blocking technologies.
Find a detailed Private Internet Access review here.
Server Collection
How many servers does CyberGhost and PIA have?
In general, the more servers a vpn company has the more options you’ll get when choosing a server to connect to.
It also means that loads could be evenly spread over the servers thereby lessening the burden on particular servers during peak times.
CyberGhost more than 8,000 vpn servers that are situated in 89 different countries at the time of writing this PIA vs CyberGhost comparison.
PIA on the other hand, only has 3,340 servers that are based in 32 countries spread across the globe.
It is therefore clear that CyberGhost has more servers in general and covers a larger geographical region than Private Internet Access.
If you are looking for a vpn that has a larger server collection then I recommend CyberGhost.
Streaming
Are you looking for a vpn that will be able to unblock your favorite video streaming platform?
Most vpns struggle to unblock geo restricted content on most of the video streaming platforms because these platforms are great at detecting and blocking vpn IPs that are used to circumvent their content restrictions.
How does CyberGhost vs PIA compare in terms of their streaming capabilities?
CyberGhost, currently, is able to unblock Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video and BBC iPlayer in different countries.
Since the streaming servers are not labelled, you need to connect to a server based in the country whose content library you want to access and then access the platform.
Private Internet Access is only able to unblock Netflix for the US.
When I tried to access Netflix based in other countries like Brazil and Japan, I was blocked.
In addition to that, PIA is not able to unlock other platforms like Hulu, Amazon Prime or BBC iPlayer.
As you can see, CyberGhost is able to unblock more streaming platforms than PIA.
If you are looking for a vpn that is great for streaming then I recommend CyberGhost over PIA.
Speeds
I started by saying that both PIA and CyberGhost have great connection speeds.
But how does CyberGhost vs PIA compare in terms of the internet speeds?
Most vpns blatantly lie about the speeds of their servers.
So I put CyberGhost and PIA speeds to test by connecting to three of their servers that are based in the US, UK and Hong Kong.
I then used speedtest.bet by Ookla to measure their download and upload speeds before and after connecting to their servers.
CyberGhost was able to deliver amazing speeds that were 83% on average of my initial speeds.
Private Internet Access, on the flip side, had an average download speed of 94% of my download speeds before connecting to their servers.
It is therefore clear that PIA delivers faster speeds than CyberGhost.
If you are looking for a vpn that is faster than the other then I recommend PIA over CyberGhost.
Torrenting
If you’ve been online for sometime then you probably already know the dangers of torrenting without a vpn.
It exposes your IP address which makes it easy to trace your torrenting activities back to you, identify you and then sue you in a court of law.
In order to stay safe, ensure that you only start torrenting after connecting to a vpn server.
How does CyberGhost vs PIA compare in terms of their torrenting support?
CyberGhost vpn enables you to download torrent files flawlessly from their P2P servers. Since not all their servers permit torrenting, you first need to connect to dedicated torrenting servers before you start downloading any files.
PIA, on the flip side, supports torrenting on all their servers.
Since all Private Internet Access servers are optimized for P2P file sharing, you don’t need to connect to any special servers in order to start torrenting.
It is therefore clear that PIA has better support for torrenting than CyberGhost.
If you are looking for a vpn that is great for torrenting then I recommend PIA because you’ll get faster download speeds.
Privacy Policy
Which one between PIA and CyberGhost will offer you your privacy online?
Privacy on the internet is becoming hard to come by these days as most governments have become very aggressive with their desire to spy on you.
Even though vpns offer a way out of this surveillance, you should ensure that your vpn does not keep logs that could be used to identify you or tie certain activities on their servers to you.
CyberGhost, being located in Romania, is based is a country that is great for implementing privacy policies.
This is because Romania does not have mandatory data retention laws and also does not form part of the 14 eyes countries surveillance alliance.
In addition to that CyberGhost states in their privacy policy that they do not keep logs of your connection timestamps, IP address or session durations.
So they don’t have any logs that could be used to identify you, which is great for privacy online.
Private Internet Access, however, is not based in privacy friendly place.
The United States, where PIA is based, is a member of the 14 eyes countries surveillance alliance that spy on their citizens and share their personal information.
In addition to that, the US also has laws that obligate vpn companies to comply anytime the governments asks for certain users logs through a court order.
That notwithstanding, PIA wants to provide you with private and anonymous internet access.
According to their privacy policy, they keep no traffic logs.
I don’t find that good enough. I think PIA should state clearly what kind of logs they don’t keep… just like CyberGhost does it.
If you are looking for a vpn that is very transparent and honest about their zero logs policy then I recommend CyberGhost instead of PIA.
Encryption and Data Protection
Encrypting your traffic makes sure that it is not visible in plain text to unintended users.
So only the device for which this information is intended will be able to decrypt and display the actual information.
Let’s now compare Private Internet Access vs CyberGhost in terms of their encryption and data protection technologies.
CyberGhost uses a military grade AES 256-bit encryption technology to encrypt your personal information.
PIA, on the other side, uses a 128-bit encryption technology to encrypt and protect your personal data.
Even though both encryption technologies are bullet proof, 256-bit offers more security while 128-bit offers faster speeds.
CyberGhost also supports two of the most secure protocols that are OpenVPN and IKEv2 to transmit your information.
PIA currently supports more connection protocols that include OpenVPN, PPTP, L2TP and IPSec.
However, protocols like PPTP are insecure and should never be used unless you know what you are doing.
Overall, both PIA and CyberGhost guarantee secure internet connections.
If you are looking for a vpn that supports more connection protocols then I recommend PIA.
Ad Blockers
Are you looking for a vpn that has an inbuilt ad blocker?
An ad blocker will enable you to block ads from displaying on most the websites that you visit.
It will also block the adware that these websites install on your browser from tracking you and following with ads around the web.
CyberGhost and PIA both have inbuilt ad blockers that when turned on, will disable ads on these websites that you visit and deliver an ad free browsing experience.
These apps also have malware blockers that will protect your devices from being infected by malware in case you visit a malware infected website, like a known phishing website.
Overall, both CyberGhost and Private Internet Access are able to protect you from ads and malware from the internet.
If you are looking for a vpn app that has a malware and adware blocker then I recommend either CyberGhost or PIA.
Dedicated IPs
For most internet access, you are better off using the shared IP address that your vpn app assigns you every time you connect to their vpn server.
It is also important to remember that these IPs do change every now and then in order to make it impossible to trace you.
However, for some sensitive applications like your work network, you’ll need a dedicated IP in order to have secure access.
As for these networks, you first need to whitelist an IP address because you can use it for remote access.
CyberGhost has a dedicated IP address that you can purchase separately. Once you have it you can whitelist this IP in your work network and connect using it if you want to access this particular network.
Private Internet Access, unfortunately, does not have any dedicated IPs at the time of writing this CyberGhost vs PIA comparison.
If you are looking for a vpn that supports a dedicated IP then I recommend CyberGhost.
Kill Switch
How do you ensure that your real IP address never gets leaked out on the web?
Buy forcing all your internet traffic through your vpn tunnel through an automatic internet kill switch.
An internet kill switch will block internet access for your device in case the vpn app disconnects from the server.
This prevents some other apps from continuing to access the internet which might expose your real IP address and reveal your identity.
CyberGhost and Private Internet Access both have a kill switch in their apps that will ensure that you can only access the internet when you are connected to your vpn.
Once turned on, it prevents your IP from being exposed when you are switching vpn servers.
If you are looking for a vpn that has an inbuilt kill switch then either PIA or CyberGhost is a great option.
Split Tunnelling
Like we already saw earlier, some applications are sensitive and will not like the strange IPs that your vpn provides.
In some of these instances, say for your internet banking application, you might want to be able to exempt them from having their traffic channelled through your vpn tunnel.
Instead, you want to have their traffic routed as usual through your ISP, using the IP that these apps already recognize.
That’s when you need a split tunnel.
A split tunnel enables you to whitelist certain applications and exclude them from the vpn so that they operate normally.
This might also help if you have an application that you don’t want slowed down by the speed drops caused by vpn connections.
It could be your application that runs backups for example.
While CyberGhost supports split tunnelling for websites and urls, PIA does not support it at all.
With CyberGhost you’ll be able to specify certain websites that will be exempted from your vpn tunnel.
So when on these websites, your traffic is not encrypted by a vpn and the IP that these websites see is that given to you by your ISP.
You don’t have the protection and anonymity that a vpn provides when on these whitelisted websites.
If you are looking for a vpn that has a vpn split tunnel then I recommend CyberGhost.
Works in China?
If you are considering someday using your vpn from inside China then you should know that not all vpns work in China.
China bans the use of vpns, so their firewall is able to detect any vpn traffic and block it.
They do this to ensure that they can fully enforce their content censorship because they know that a vpn will enable you to access websites that have been blocked by the government.
Let’s now compare CyberGhost vs PIA in terms of their ability to bypass the great firewall of China.
In order for a vpn to be able to bypass the great firewall of China, it needs to make its traffic look like normal https traffic so that it is not detected and blocked buy the deep packet inspection technology od China’s firewall.
Unfortunately, neither Private Internet Access nor CyberGhost vpn is able to bypass the great firewall of China.
If you want a vpn that will work in China then I don’t recommend either CyberGhost or PIA because these vpns are blocked in China.
You might want to consider other options like NordVPN or PrivateVPN.
Pricing
As we near the end of this CyberGhost vs Private Internet Access comparison, let’s look at their pricing plans to establish the cheaper one.
If you want to get the best discount for any vpn, you should always opt for their longest plan.
The longer the plan the cheaper it gets.
CyberGhost has a 3 year plan that costs $ 2.75/month while PIA has a 1 year plan that costs $ 3.33/month.
As you can see, CyberGhost is a cheaper vpn and also offers longer subscription plans if you don’t want to be bothered by renewing your plans every year that comes.
If you are looking for a great vpn that will save you some bucks then I recommend CyberGhost.
Payment Options
Let’s finish this Private Internet Access vs CyberGhost comparison by looking at the various payment methods that they accept.
In order to ensure you give as little information about as possible, you should choose a vpn that supports anonymous payments methods as they don’t require a billing address.
So you can give little personal identifiable information by signing up with a fake email address and paying with some crypto.
CyberGhost and Private Internet Access currently accept PayPal, all major credit cards and cryptocurrency payments through currencies like Bitcoins.
If you are looking for a vpn that supports Bitcoin payments then I recommend either PIA or CyberGhost.
In Conclusion
I hope this PIA vs CyberGhost comparison has helped you learn about the pros and cons of these two vpns.
Are you now ready to make a choice between either PIA or CyberGhost?
If you are looking for a vpn that has excellent connection speeds, allows torrenting on all its servers and supports more connected devices then I recommend PIA.
However, if you are looking for a vpn with a greater server distribution, unblocks more streaming platforms and has a strict zero logs policy then I recommend CyberGhost.
Have you used either CyberGhost or PIA before?
Please share your experience in the comments below.
