If you are looking for a side by comparison of NordVPN and Ivacy then you’ve come to the right place.
While these two VPNs have a lot of similarities, they also have a ton of differences when it comes to their performance in various aspects like torrenting and connection speeds.
In this NordVPN vs Ivacy comparison we are going to look that pros and cons of these two VPNs.
We’ll compare these two VPNs along the lines of their connection speeds, streaming capabilities as well as torrenting support, among other features.
I hope that by the end of this Ivacy vs NordVPN comparison, you’ll be able to decide the better VPN for you between the two.
Let’s get started.
About
NordVPN is a popular VPN service provider with its headquarters in Panama that enables you to access the internet securely in restricted countries like China.
Since it is a pretty old VPN company, founded in the year 2012, it has since acquired a sizeable user base… amounting to more than 12 million subscribers.
Here is a detailed NordVPN review.
Ivacy on the other hand is a VPN company based in Singapore, a pretty surprising location as most VPNs are based either in Europe or North America.
It was, however, founded earlier before NordVPN… having been established in the year 2007 by the company PMG Private Limited.
Check out my unbiased Ivacy review.
Server Collection
How many servers do both Ivacy and NordVPN have?
In order to provide you with enough options when choosing a server to connect to, a VPN needs to ensure that they have a huge arsenal of servers. With a sizeable collection, it makes it easy to find a server in any country that you’d like to connect to.
NordVPN, being the big brother here, has more than 5,811 servers that are spread out in 59 different countries.
Ivacy, on the other hand, only has 1,000 servers that are based in 50 different countries.
As you can see, while NordVPN has more servers in general, Ivacy does a better job of spreading out their servers to cover just as large a geographical region as NordVPN.
Streaming
How does Ivacy vs NordVPN compare in terms of their abilities to unblock content on popular streaming platforms like Netflix?
If your particular reason for purchasing a VPN is to stream geo restricted content on platforms like Netflix and Hulu, then you need to really read this part keenly before you make up your mind.
Most of these streaming platforms are great at detecting VPN IPs that are used to circumvent their content restrictions and block them.
It’s even easy because when more than 100 people use the same IP to stream, all at the same time, these platforms can pretty much figure out what is happening. So a good VPN should be able to replace their IPs as soon as they are detected and blocked.
NordVPN currently is able to unblock all the major streaming platforms that you might be interested in streaming.
Using NordVPN servers you’ll be able to stream content destined for the US audience, UK, Canada, Germany, Japan and Brazil.
Apart from Netflix, NordVPN is also able to unblock content on platforms like Hulu and Amazon Prime using their servers that located in the United States.
Lastly, BBC iPlayer will also work flawlessly using their servers that are based in the UK.
Ivacy, on the other hand, also has great streaming capabilities.
They even take it a step further by labelling all their streaming servers to make it easier for you to identify the server that you want.
In order to stream, just head over to the streaming options and their you’ll see options for all the streaming platforms that you’ve heard of and their dedicated servers.
At the time of writing this Ivacy vs NordVPN comparison in 2021, Ivacy is able to unblock Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime and BBC iPlayer among others.
So when it comes to streaming, NordVPN and Ivacy VPN square it out.
Speed
How do you enjoy these streaming services if your internet is too slow?
Let’s now compare NordVPN with Ivacy speeds to establish which one is faster between the two. The faster a VPN is, the better the user experience that you’ll get.
In order to test their speeds, I connected to three different servers based in the US, UK and Hong Kong.
I then used the site speedtest.net by Ookla to measure the download speed, upload speed and ping time before and after connecting to their servers.
Here is what I established.
NordVPN had an average download speed of 83% of my original download speeds before connecting to their servers.
This gave its speed a rating of 4.1/5, which is great.
Ivacy on the other hand, also had an average download speed of 83% of my original speeds, giving Ivacy speeds a rating of 4.1/5 as well.
So as you can see, both Ivacy and NordVPN again square it out when it comes to their connection speeds.
While servers in certain locations will be a little slower, you can generally expect NordVPN and Ivacy to deliver great speeds on average.
In fact, they are among the best VPNs for fast internet in 2021.
Torrenting
You don’t want to start downloading any torrent file without first using a VPN to hide your IP address.
This is because, if your torrenting activities can be traced back to you, it is easy for you to land in a hot copyright infringement lawsuit that you don’t know how to get out of.
So how do NordVPN and Ivacy perform when it comes to torrenting?
NordVPN currently supports torrenting on its dedicated torrenting servers.
So if you want to download any kind of torrent file from the internet, all you need to do is locate the P2P servers and then choose the most appropriate one for you.
Once connected, you can pretty much enjoy anonymous torrenting as NordVPN does not keep logs as we’ll discover in a moment.
Ivacy on the other hand, also supports torrenting.
Just like NordVPN, Ivacy has specialized P2P servers that are dedicated for torrenting activities.
All you need to do is click on the torrenting option in the app then choose from a list of torrenting servers that are available to you.
And since Ivacy also does not keep logs of your IP address and such, you can pretty much enjoy private torrenting while connected on the Ivacy servers without any worries.
In fact, Ivacy and NordVPN are among the best VPNs for torrenting in 2021.
Privacy Policy
Now let’s talk privacy policies.
How does NordVPN vs Ivacy compare in terms of their privacy policies?
It is through the privacy policies that you’ll establish if a VPN is secretly logging some personally identifiable information that could actually be used to compromise your identity online.
So we’ll look at where the VPN is located and then whether they keep sensitive logs or not.
NordVPN, first of all, is located in Panama… like we already saw earlier.
Since Panama is not a founding member of the 14 eyes countries surveillance alliance, it is a pretty much great location for a VPN that is conscious of privacy.
In addition to that, NordVPN does not keep any sensitive logs that could be used to identify you.
It means there are no logs of your IP address, DNS queries, connection timestamps or even bandwidth usage on their servers.
Ivacy, on the other hand, is located in Singapore, another privacy friendly country… even though some would argue that this country has lately warmed up to the west and can readily share intel with them.
The interesting part is that Ivacy does not keep any logs of your IP address, DNS queries or connection timestamps. So it means there is no information on their servers to share anyway.
Overall, both NordVPN and Ivacy seem to be VPN companies that really take your privacy and anonymity online seriously, and therefore can be trusted.
However, since it is only NordVPN that has undergone an independent audit to prove their claims, I would only vouch for NordVPN in this case and not Ivacy.
Here are some other VPNs that have been audited for true no logs.
Encryption and Data Protection
A VPN protects your data during transmission by ensuring that it is impossible for a hacker to decrypt and see the actual information.
This is thanks to encryption technologies that will make the data look like a gobbled mess even if a hacker got hold of it. So which encryption technologies do Ivacy and NordVPN use?
At the time of writing this Ivacy vs NordVPN comparison, I established that both NordVPN and Ivacy use the AES 256-bit encryption technology.
This is the kind of encryption that is also used by militaries to encrypt sensitive information.
So it is pretty tamper proof and cannot be hacked.
In addition to that, NordVPN and Ivacy also employ the use of certain VPN connection protocols to ensure that the communication between your VPN app and the server is securely established.
NordVPN currently only supports OpenVPN and IKEv2 protocols.
OpenVPN being the default protocol in the desktop apps and Android apps while IKEv2 being used in the iOS mobile app.
Ivacy, on the other hand, supports a lot more protocols than NordVPN.
Ivacy supports OpenVPN, IKEv2/IPSec, L2TP, SSTP and PPTP protocols.
Even though OpenVPN and IKEv2 are currently the most secure protocols, Ivacy wins here if you are looking for a VPN that would support a tad more protocols.
Ad Blocker
Do you want to be able to block ads when browsing the internet?
Then you need a VPN that has a powerful ad blocker that can turn off those intrusive video ads that really have nothing to do with the content on the site you are on.
In fact, these video ads consume a lot of bandwidth they may just exhaust your internet bandwidth before you realize it.
So do NordVPN and Ivacy have ad blockers?
NordVPN has a powerful feature called CyberSec that enables you to blocks ads.
Once turned on, CyberSec will not only ensure that ads are blocked on the sites that you visit, but that the ad tracking scripts that these networks install on your browser are also disabled.
In addition to blocking advertisements from running, CyberSec also comes with a malware blocker that can also protect your devices from internet malware.
Ivacy, on the other hand, does not have any kind of ad blockers or even malware blockers.
So if you are using Ivacy, blocking ads is out of question… unless you use some other kind of browser extension for this.
If an ad blocker is a real deal for you, then in this case I would go with NordVPN.
Dedicated IPs
Do you realize that sometimes when you visit certain websites when you are connected to a VPN you are asked to fill out a captcha? To prove that you are not a robot?
Its because you are using an IP address that has been abused by someone before.
Probably the IP address was used to carry out a DoS attack and therefore got itself blacklisted on these websites.
In order to remedy that, you need to use a dedicated IP address that is only used by you. This reduces the chance that someone else somewhere had used it and abuse it.
Do NordVPN and Ivacy have dedicated IPs?
NordVPN has both static and dedicated IPs.
While static IPs are free and come with every plan of NordVPN, dedicated IPs are a premium addon that you have to purchase separately. Often, the static IPs are still used by other people but it’s a rather small number of people.
Dedicated IPs on the other hand are only used by you.
Ivacy also has dedicated IP addresses that you can purchase separately.
Even though it doesn’t have static IPs, the dedicated IPs are sufficient for most use cases, like when you need to whitelist them in your work network.
You should however remember that since a dedicated is linked to your account, any activity on this IP address is linked to you… so you don’t wanna torrent with a dedicated IP.
Kill Switch
While some people just operate a VPN without turning on a kill switch, I am always keen to ensure that the kill switch is actually turned on and that it is actually working.
A kill ensures that whenever your VPN app disconnects from the server, internet access for your device is cut off. This ensures that other applications do not continue to access the internet without your VPN, and thereby exposing your real IP address to the sites that you visit.
This is something that you should avoid at all costs, especially if you are running uTorrent in the background.
Do Ivacy and NordVPN have a kill switch?
Both NordVPN and Ivacy have an automatic internet kill switch that you can turn on to protect your devices.
Once turned on, they will ensure that you are only able to access the internet through an encrypted VPN tunnel and nothing less.
Split Tunnelling
Even though some people might not use it, split is something that I often need with a VPN for special occasions.
There are times when you access your internet banking site with a VPN and you are asked to provide additional verification. It’s because your bank does not recognize that IP address.
If you want to remedy this without purchasing a dedicated IP, you can split tunnels so that traffic from your banking app or website goes through your ISP as usual while everything else goes through the VPN tunnel.
Because your banking app already recognizes your ISP given IP address, you can expect to not have any issues.
How does NordVPN vs Ivacy compare in terms of their split tunneling capabilities?
NordVPN, unfortunately, does not have a split tunnel.
So you can split tunnels for your internet traffic and exempt certain apps from your VPN tunnel.
Ivacy, luckily, has a split tunnel that you can use to isolate certain applications from the VPN and have their traffic go through your ISP as usual. This is a great feature for various reasons… like I already hinted above.
One thing you should remember is that the traffic that is exempted from the VPN tunnel is not encrypted.
So you don’t get to benefit from the additional security and anonymity that a VPN tunnel provides… you are now visible to your ISP on these whitelisted apps.
Works in China?
If you are thinking of using either Ivacy or NordVPN in China, then we are about to establish which one you should go for in that case.
In China, there is a firewall with deep packet inspection technology that is able to detect and block any kind of VPN traffic.
They do this to ensure that no one is using a VPN to access restricted content in this country. It is also for this reason that most VPNs are blocked in China.
So how do NordVPN and Ivacy compare in terms of their ability to bypass the great firewall of China?
NordVPN has an obfuscated server technology that you can use to access the internet in China.
Once in this mode, NordVPN makes your traffic look like normal HTTPS traffic and thereby fly under the radar of the DPI technology without being detected.
So you’ll be able to use NordVPN in China.
Ivacy, on the other hand, is also able to work in China.
Even though it doesn’t have any special servers mode to activate, you simply need to connect to their actual servers in China if you want to access the internet in China.
This even makes it easier as you are using real servers that are based in the country. So chances of being detected and getting blocked are minimal.
Overall, both NordVPN and Ivacy VPN are great VPNs for use in China.
In fact, they both make it to the list of the best VPNs for China in 2021, just in case you wanted to know of other VPNs that work in China.
Pricing
As we near the end of this Ivacy vs NordVPN comparison, let’s now look at their various pricing plans.
Our aim here is to establish the cheaper VPN of the two.
There is a common practice in the VPN industry where VPNs offer larger, often crazy, discounts on their longer plans in order to entice you to commit to a longer stay.
It is completely normal and it is something that should not offend you.
NordVPN has their longest plan being the 3 years plan which is also the cheapest with the best discount. With this plan, you only get to pay $ 3.49/month, billable upfront for the first 36 months.
Ivacy, on the flip side, has their longest plan being the 2 years plan that goes for only $ 2.25/month, billable upfront as $ 54.
So again when it comes to pricing, Ivacy wins as it saves you a couple bucks on the 2 year plans.
Payment Options
What payment options do you have when purchasing either Ivacy or NordVPN?
Let’s finish this NordVPN vs Ivacy comparison in 2021 by looking at the methods that you can use to make payment for your subscription.
If you have an option, I would recommend you opt for anonymous payment methods like Bitcoins or gift cards. These method enable you to give as little information about you as possible, as they don’t require a billing address.
NordVPN support payments through credit cards and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoins.
Surprisingly, they don’t accept PayPal payments.
Ivacy, on the other hand, supports credit card payments, cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin as well as PayPal payments.
So Ivacy gives more options, though I don’t think that’s a big deal because someone who is able to pay with PayPal should also be able to pay with their credit/debit card.
In Conclusion
There you have it… the Ivacy vs NordVPN comparison.
I hope the comparison these two VPNs has helped you learn of the similarities that exist between these two popular VPN service providers.
Are you now ready to make a choice between either Ivacy or NordVPN?
If you are looking for a robust solution to your VPN needs then I strongly recommend NordVPN.
But if you are on a tight budget and just want a cheap solution to your problem, then Ivacy is a cheaper VPN overall than NordVPN.
Have you used either Ivacy or NordVPN before?
Please share your experience in the comments below.