The number of VPN services for you to choose from continues to grow at a rapid rate. There are now hundreds on the market, many of which claim to be the best. However, it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction, particularly because testing each VPN would be so time-consuming (and expensive!). Besides, you may find some aspects of VPNs (encryption, for example) to be too technical, particularly if it’s your first time using one.

Fortunately, there’s an easier way to find a VPN that fits your needs. In this post, we’re putting CyberGhost and Betternet side-by-side in an effort to compare and contrast what they each have to offer. We’ll look at everything from their server speeds to the speed of their response to email enquiries, breaking it all down in a format that’s easy to read and understand. Hopefully, you’ll then have a better idea of which VPN best fits your needs or whether you need to look elsewhere (we have plenty more VPN comparison posts to help!).

Just want to find out the main benefits of each VPN and make a quick decision? Here’s a bullet point list to save you some time (CyberGhost wins comfortably in this case):

Highlights

CyberGhost

  • Fastest VPN we’ve tested
  • Huge server network (~9,000 servers in 90+ countries)
  • Extra security features including auto wifi protection
  • Live chat support (available 24/7)

Betternet

  • Speeds are fast enough for streaming
  • Allows torrenting on its servers
  • Beginner-friendly desktop and mobile apps
  • Servers in dozens of countries (over 70 in all)

CyberGhost vs Betternet pricing

While CyberGhost and Betternet both offer monthly and annual plans, CyberGhost provides a greater deal of flexibility. It has two- and three-year deals available. The longer the subscription, the more you can save. This is reflected in the fact that you pay as little as $2.29 USD a month when you choose the CyberGhost three year (+ 3 months free) subscription. This works out at just $89.31 in all, a huge discount of 82 percent.

In contrast, Betternet’s best deal is its 12-month plan. This costs $95.88 in all ($7.99/month) which is a discount of 38 percent from the monthly price. Even with this discount, Betternet’s annual plan is still far more expensive than that of CyberGhost, which costs just $51.48 per year. However, their monthly plans are both priced at $12.99.

Aside from the major pricing differences, CyberGhost is the only one of the two that comes with a money-back guarantee. While most major VPNs offer 30 days, CyberGhost’s money-back guarantee is even longer at 45 days. This provides you with plenty of time to try it out risk-free. While Betternet doesn’t have such an option, there is a 7-day free trial of the premium plan. You can also find a free tier, although this has numerous restrictions.

Best Deal for CyberGhost:Pay just $2.29 a month ($95.88 total) with the CyberGhost three year plan, a saving of 82 percent.

Best Deal for Betternet:Get 38 percent off with Betternet’s 12 month subscription plan. This works out at $7.99 monthly ($95.88 in all).

CyberGhost vs Betternet features

If you have a lot of devices to secure, CyberGhost is your best bet. That’s because it lets you connect up to seven devices at the same time compared to the five simultaneous connections allowed by Betternet. While the two VPNs offer split tunneling (the option to choose which traffic is routed via the VPN connection), it is only available on Android in the case of CyberGhost and Windows with Betternet.

Overall, Betternet is very light on features, although it does have a browser extension for Chrome. CyberGhost also has a Chrome extension as well as one for Firefox. Remember that while a browser extension offers convenience, it only secures browser traffic and not apps.

Unlike Betternet, CyberGhost has an ad blocker and its own private browser built in.

Streaming and unblocking

When you travel abroad, you may find that you can no longer access some of your favorite websites and services from home. A VPN can help you get around geographic restrictions by spoofing your location. However, some VPNs are better than others at unblocking, particularly when it comes to streaming services that often have the toughest restrictions.

China

Your VPN should work in almost any country you visit. One noticeable exception is China, a country notorious for its strict censorship restrictions. The Great Firewall of China blocks VPN traffic and even access to VPN websites. As such, many VPNs don’t work in the country. Unfortunately, this includes CyberGhost and Betternet.

The best VPNs for China are able to stay one step ahead. These include the likes of NordVPN, Surfshark, and ExpressVPN. However, all of these VPNs have their websites blocked in China. In order to use one in the country, you’ll need to install it ahead of your visit.

Setup and interface

Even if it’s your first time using a VPN, you’re unlikely to have any issues downloading and installing CyberGhost or Betternet, both of which provide an automatic setup wizard for their desktop and mobile apps. As a result, you’ll be able to get everything set up within a matter of minutes.

CyberGhost’s desktop app manages to pack plenty of relevant information in without it feeling too cluttered. While there’s a quick-connect button to save you some time, you can also search for a server via a drop-down menu or search bar. There’s the option to favorite servers for faster future access while you can also see the distance a server is from your physical location as well as its current user load (the lower, the better).

Like its desktop app, CyberGhost’s mobile app has a quick-connect button. The interface is very clean and easy to navigate. Again, there are multiple ways to search for servers. This includes a category of streaming-friendly servers which states which streaming service each server best works with.

Betternet’s desktop and mobile apps are very similar. There’s minimal information presented at first glance with a large quick-connect button taking up much of the view. However, you can get to the full server list in a single click while the settings page is easy to navigate thanks to the various toggle buttons such as the kill switch feature.

Servers and performance

When it comes to network size and server speed, CyberGhost not only beats Betternet but indeed most VPNs on the market. It has close to 9,000 servers in all. What’s more, these servers are located across over 90 countries. Having access to so many servers means that not only can you access a wider range of geo-restricted content, there’s more likely to be a fast, low load server in your preferred location.

In contrast to CyberGhost, Betternet isn’t particularly transparent about the number of servers it offers. We even enquired about this number but only received a website link to server locations. The good news is that it does have servers in plenty of locations—more than 70 countries. Indeed, it even offers servers in some locations that CyberGhost doesn’t (such as Azerbaijan, Nepal, and Uruguay).

CyberGhost is faster than Betternet and it’s not remotely close. We carry out speed tests on each VPN we review and CyberGhost happens to be the fastest VPN we’ve come across. It averaged 548 Mbps whereas Betternet averaged 52 Mbps. However, Betternet’s speeds are still more than fast enough for most bandwidth-intensive activities such as streaming, particularly because there’s unlimited bandwidth (as with CyberGhost).

Here’s a list of countries in which CyberGhost and Betternet have servers:

Security

CyberGhost offers a little more flexibility than Betternet when it comes to the VPN protocols you can use. That’s because it offers the options of WireGuard, OpenVPN, and IKEv2. Each offers its own pros and cons, but WireGuard is increasingly popular thanks to its faster speeds. Betternet only offers Catapult Hydra, which is its own proprietary protocol. This is shared with the likes of Hotspot Shield and offers obfuscation to disguise VPN traffic and bypass blocks.

Connecting to a CyberGhost or Betternet server ensures your internet traffic is secured with 256-bit AES encryption. However, one difference is that CyberGhost’s RSA keys are longer, which makes them more difficult to crack. Both VPNs offer a kill switch so that if your VPN connection drops, your internet traffic is cut to prevent leaks. However, it’s CyberGhost that offers the most security features. Indeed, you’ll also find an ad blocker and automatic wifi protection in its apps.

Privacy

If you place particular importance on your online privacy, you’ll probably want to avoid Betternet. That’s because it does keep some logs such as the duration of session and amount of bandwidth consumed. There are also some logs including websites visited (although these aren’t tied to specific users). However, it doesn’t keep any identifying logs.

CyberGhost operates a strict no-logs policy and is headquartered in Romania. Betternet operates out of the US which is a member of the Five Eyes (and 14 Eyes) intelligence alliance. Your data could therefore be shared with other countries were it to be obtained (although it’s unlikely the average user will be on the radar).

Signing up for a CyberGhost or Betternet account only requires an email address. You can always use a burner account for added anonymity. However, there’s no anonymous payment option available with Betternet. CyberGhost accepts payment in Bitcoin which, if used in conjunction with a mixer/tumbler service, can be spent anonymously.

Configuration

Most VPNs use shared address allocation. CyberGhost and Betternet are no exception. Everyone on the same server is assigned the same IP address so that all online activity is essentially mixed together. This makes it almost impossible to know which user did what. Regardless, both VPNs encrypt your traffic and neither VPN keeps identifying logs, so this shouldn’t be an issue anyway.

Betternet is somewhat limited on features and there’s no option to obtain a dedicated or static IP address. CyberGhost does let you get a dedicated IP address for an extra $3.75 a month. Available locations include the US, Canada, Australia, UK, France, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Japan. Dedicated IPs offer a number of advantages including less frequent CAPTCHAs and reduced risk of IP blacklisting.

Customer Service

In terms of customer support, only CyberGhost offers live chat 24 hours a day. This is generally the quickest way for you to get an answer to your questions. However, both VPNs have email support. To test the response time and compare it with that of other VPN providers, we sent CyberGhost and Betternet three emails each. Betternet was marginally faster with an average email response time of one hour and 40 minutes. CyberGhost took two hours and 15 minutes on average.

Here are the questions we sent out to CyberGhost and Betternet, complete with response times for each:

The Winner

CyberGhost

Apps Available:

  • PC
  • Mac
  • IOS
  • Android
  • Linux

Website: www.Cyberghost.com

Money-back guarantee: 45 DAYS

While Betternet does have some advantages compared to some VPNs, it falls short in most areas compared to CyberGhost. For example, while it has servers in more than 70 countries, CyberGhost’s network covers over 90 countries. Further, Betternet doesn’t disclose how many servers it has (CyberGhost has nearly 9,000).

Based on the above findings, CyberGhost is the clear winner. It was ten times as fast as Betternet in our most recent speed tests. This makes it far more suitable for HD and 4K streaming. CyberGhost is a much stronger unblocker of content and comes with more security features including auto wifi protection and an ad blocker. Unlike Betternet, CyberGhost is a no-logs provider and, should you need it, 24/7 live chat support is available.

Despite the above, CyberGhost is significantly cheaper than Betternet when you opt for an annual or multi-year subscription. Last but not least, CyberGhost comes with a 45-day money-back guarantee. Most major VPNs offer up to 30 days (Betternet only has a 7-day free trial of its Premium tier).