Were I to be completely honest, I've generally not seen the need for a VPN until very recently. Sure, VPNs are great if, say, you wanna watch Twin Peaks again but it's only available on your streaming service of choice in a whole other country; with a VPN, you simply select your virtual home away from home, and you'll be confronting the horrors alongside FBI agent Dale Cooper in no time.
Now luckily for you, I'm not going to start waxing lyrical about Fire Walk With Me—but only because my colleagues have just handed me a card about a Future-exclusive NordVPN deal. From now until March 28 23:59 BST, you can get up to 77% off a NordVPN subscription, and that's far from all. If you sign up now to either a 2-year Plus or Ultimate plan, you'll also get four extra months free and an Amazon gift card on top.
The Plus tier enjoys the steepest discount, with the two-year plan costing $92/£70 all-in. For about $3/£2 a month, you'll enjoy not just a fast, secure VPN, but also anti-malware protection, a data breach scanner, and a password manager—plus a $20/£20 Amazon gift card too.
It's a cracking deal on what we rate as not only the best VPN for gaming, but pretty much everything else too. So, beyond marathoning a show you probably should've just bought on physical media years ago, why is now a great time to start using a VPN?
For gaming specifically, hopping on a VPN is great for both security and speed. To begin with, if you're at all concerned about toxic players getting wind of your actual IP address, a VPN offers one more layer of protection and a whole lot of peace of mind. As for the subject of speed, some internet service providers in the UK and US have been known to throttle gaming traffic at peak times. A VPN makes it slightly harder for your ISP to tell if you're gaming or not, and therefore makes it easier for you to avoid being on the wrong side of its bandwidth management practices.
There are plenty of reasons besides even gaming. As I've written about before, I'm currently locked out of my BlueSky direct messages. This is due to the UK's Online Safety Act now requiring platforms like BlueSky carry out age assurance checks on its users and my own stubbornness—I'm personally not keen to hand over either my bank card, my ID, or my wizened visage to a third-party age check vendor. For the time being, a VPN allows me to answer my most urgent DM's without handing over my personal data for the privilege.
But also, did you know that UK Netflix has a bunch of Studio Ghibli movies like Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke? You could catch these animated flicks in the US via HBO Max—but a two year subscription to NordVPN could work out cheaper in the long run.
1. Best gaming laptop: Razer Blade 16
2. Best gaming PC: HP Omen 35L
3. Best handheld gaming PC: Lenovo Legion Go S SteamOS ed.
4. Best mini PC: Minisforum AtomMan G7 PT
5. Best VR headset: Meta Quest 3
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