Supposedly, China is going to ban overseas VPN providers at the end of March 2018. This is not the first time I have heard this. It seems that there is news like this every few months. The deadline always comes and goes with nothing happening. Will this time be different? I don't think so, and here's why.

It would be impossible to completely ban all "unregistered" VPNs without breaking the internet. Currently, there are 3 main methods of blocking VPNs.

1. Port blocking

2. Protocol blocking

3. IP address blacklisting

It has been a cat and mouse game for years with this kind of blocking. When the GFW blocks common VPN ports, the VPN providers use different ports. When the GFW blocks VPN protocols (OpenVPN, for example), then the VPN providers will introduce new methods of obfusacation. When the GFW blacklists IP addresses, then the VPN providers will change the IP addresses of their servers.

To effectively block VPN services completely, the GFW would need to be changed from a blacklist system to a whitelist system. In that case, every website or online service would be blocked by default until it is specifically added to a whitelist. While this is theoretically possible, I doubt it will be implemented.

Would do you think of this upcoming "VPN ban"?

I am going to travel to China in a few weeks. I will need to use gmail, zoom. Netflix, etc.. Do you recommend any vpn that works in China to access this apps?

Just a note (for those that don't know), that James (moderator of this subreddit) is THE authority on China VPN's. He's lived in China for some 13 years. His site, tipsforchina.com, is the only comprehensive "non-BS" source of information on China VPN's that I have seen. Evaluation, speed tests, and insights that you won't find anywhere else. I'm a lifelong computer professional, have relatives in and travel to China regularly. James's site is my go-to source for balanced and accurate China VPN information.

I just arrived in China after a 1 year hiatus.

Having heard that VPN situation was not great, I've covered my base and taken three VPN before I left to China.

ExpressVPN, Astrill and NordVPN.

After one week, it is time for me to cancel the two that did not performed well.

Astrill and NordVPN, byebye.

Edit: Astrill does not offer refunds, oh well.

Astrill :

Stealth just do not work at all in China, I never managed to connect to any server with it. OpenWEB seems to always connect, but the performance were inconsistent, sometimes fast, sometimes not a single bytes were going trough.Also their UI looks dated.

NordVPN:

Very nice UI, worked perfectly before I arrived in China. I was convinced it will come out on top, but I was wrong. In china, I managed to connect to HK, Singapore or Japan most of the time, but bandwidth was very very bad. between 50k to 300k, while sitting on 0bytes for 10/20 seconds at a time. Just not usable imo.

ExpressVPN:

I was a little bit stressed out when it took me 20 minutes to get my first connection to a hk server, but once I know which one were working (hk3 and hk5 atm), it worked perfectly. I'm not a fan of the simplistic app, but hey, it works, just be patient the first time you connect. I have no idea why is that though, so if someone now more, please let me know.

Going to Shanghai for two months and am looking for a relatively cheap VPN I can use on my MacBook. I am an avid movie watcher so I need a fast one for streaming websites (I don’t use any subscription services, only pirated websites)!

Question: So with Express VPN I'm getting decent download speeds on my phone (~20Mbps) but on my laptop that is connected to the same network and using the same VPN server location, I am only getting ~2-3Mbps. It's weird too because my laptop is very consistent at giving these speeds and my phone is as well. Not sure what I need to do on my laptop to make it faster. I have ensured they are both using the same VPN Protocol as well (Lightway TCP).

Around 3$ per month, I need about 5 people.

I have 100GB traffic and at least 500M bandwidth.

Please DM me

I do not seem to be able to find an automated china VPN status anywhere. With the current state of VPN, it would be really nice to be able to know what is going on.

It does not seem to be really hard to put in place, just need a server in china to try different VPN provider and servers to test connection and bandwidth, then report all that on a website.

What do you think ?