How to test any VPN before you trust it

Start with the VPN off, because every result means more next to a baseline. Search for an IP lookup page, open it, and note the address and place it shows. That's you, as the internet sees you at home.

Now connect, open the page in a fresh window and look again. The address should have changed to one belonging to the VPN's exit server. With WrapVPN, that's the server you chose, so the address points to the server rather than to you.

Don't worry if the city is slightly off. Lookup pages estimate location from databases that map addresses to places, and two pages can disagree about the same address. What matters is that your own address has gone. If your connection also has a newer, longer style of address (IPv6), check that your own doesn't appear there either.

Before your device can visit a website, it looks up the site's address, rather like checking a phone book. Whoever answers those lookups learns every site you ask about, so a VPN that hides your traffic but leaves the lookups with your internet provider has left the phone book open on the counter.

A DNS test page shows who answered. With the VPN off, you'll usually see your internet provider. With it on, you shouldn't: you should see the VPN's own servers or a public DNS service reached through the tunnel, and with WrapVPN it's a public DNS service.

One trap catches reviewers out. Some browsers have their own 'secure DNS' setting and send lookups to a service of their choosing, so the test shows the browser's choice rather than the device's. That isn't a leak, since those lookups still travel through the tunnel, but it does mean the browser goes around WrapVPN's Clean Web blocker, which works on the device's normal lookups.

The next check needs a network with a sign-in page, the kind that asks for a room number or a tick in a box before anything works. A hotel, a café or an airport is ideal, so take your phone or laptop out for a coffee.

Until that page is completed, the network holds everything back, the VPN included. What you're testing is whether the VPN makes the right order clear and connects cleanly afterwards. With WrapVPN the routine is simple: complete the sign-in page first, then connect.

On Windows, WrapVPN blocks traffic that would bypass the VPN while it's connected, so the sign-in page can't load until you pause or disconnect. That's the protection doing its job. Once you're signed in to the Wi-Fi, connect again and repeat check one on this network: the address should be the exit server's, not the café's.

Run a speed test with the VPN off and note the result, then connect to the location nearest you and run it again. Expect a small drop, because your traffic takes a slightly longer route and is sealed along the way. A modest dip is normal; a dramatic one on a nearby server is worth retesting at another time of day.

Distance matters more than anything else here. Light in fibre covers about 100 km for each millisecond of round trip, so a server 1,000 km away adds at least 10 ms, and one on the other side of the world adds far more. In WrapVPN on phones, tablets and Windows PCs, each location shows a speed figure where a lower figure is faster, and on any device a location near you is usually the fastest.

That rule hides a neat trick. Connect from London to Sydney, about 17,000 km away, and run a latency test: the round trip can't come in much under 170 ms. If it does, that request didn't go through the VPN.

The last check happens on paper, and it's the one most reviews skip. You're not looking for reassurance; you're looking for a list. A useful privacy policy names what's kept, why, for how long, and who the company is. A warm, vague promise gives you nothing to hold anyone to.

Apply it to us. WrapVPN keeps connection records: your account, the time, the server and how long the session lasted. It also keeps hourly usage summaries that include the amount of data and the addresses and domain names reached, and these can be linked to your account. The privacy policy lists the other records WrapVPN keeps and how long each is kept, and that's the kind of specific answer you should expect from any VPN you're considering.

A VPN that passes shows the exit server's address, keeps your lookups away from your internet provider, connects cleanly after a sign-in page, holds a sensible speed nearby and tells you plainly what it keeps. You can run every check on WrapVPN's free plan, which gives you three one-hour sessions a week at every location. Pick a quiet evening, start with the VPN off, and work down the list.