ExpressVPN vs. NordVPN: Clash of the heavyweight titans

It’s a heavyweight matchup between the two VPN giants: ExpressVPN vs. NordVPN. They are the Godzilla and King Kong, Gates and Jobs, or Packers and Bears of the VPN world. Both offer some of the fastest, most secure, feature-rich services on the market. So which one should you choose? 

NordVPN might be cheaper in the long-term and it offers more servers, but ExpressVPN has a better privacy record and more consistent access to streaming services. While both are neck and neck, I recommend ExpressVPN for most folks. It’s our pick for best VPN overall due to its ease-of-use, unrivaled transparency, and excellent streaming support. That’s not to take anything away from NordVPN, which is also an exemplary choice. The differences are nuanced so let’s break it all down in more detail below to help you choose the best VPN for your own needs.

If you’re interested in all of our top picks for VPN head over to out best VPNs article for more great options.

ExpressVPN vs. NordVPN: Features compared

Best for speed: NordVPN (by a hair)

In my testing both NordVPN and ExpressVPN ranked with stellar speed scores. Along with Hotspot Shield they’re the fastest VPNs available. While all VPNs will slow down your internet speeds to some degree, these two slow it down the least. 

In my latest tests, ExpressVPN resulted in an average of 71 percent of the base internet speed for downloads and 80 percent of the base for uploads. NordVPN nosed it out, though, with 72 percent of the base download speeds and 80 percent of the base upload speeds. Those are razor-thin margins and the one percent difference is likely unnoticeable in daily use. 

Whichever you choose, you can expect it to handle bandwidth-heavy tasks, such as gaming and 4K streaming, with ease. However, the winner for speed — by the slimmest of margins — is NordVPN.

Best for cost: NordVPN

ExpressVPN only has one subscription tier, which will set you back $12.95 monthly, $59.94 for six months, or $99.84 for one year. NordVPN, on the other hand, offers three subscription tiers: Basic, Plus, and Ultimate. To make an equal comparison for services provided I’ll focus on NordVPN’s Plus plan, which runs $12.99 monthly, $82.35 for the first year, or $126.63 for the first two years. It’s worth noting, though, that both NordVPN’s 1-year and 2-year plans rise to $99.48 annually after their respective renewal periods.

While in the end, both services charge you practically the same prices for their annual subscriptions, NordVPN offers much better upfront discount incentives. These introductory prices mean that you can initially save a bit if you choose NordVPN over ExpressVPN. It pretty much equals out in the long term, but NordVPN’s upfront savings give it the nod in terms of costs.

Best for privacy and security: ExpressVPN

Both ExpressVPN and NordVPN are the trend-setters in the industry when it comes to comprehensive and innovative security features. Taking VPNs beyond just anonymizing your internet connection, these two companies have expanded to provide users with an entire suite of security add-ons such as ad- and tracker-blocking, password managers, and more.

If it came down to just total features, NordVPN wins. It offers multi-hop, and Onion Over VPN — both of which are currently lacking in ExpressVPN. In addition, NordVPN also gives its Plus subscription users access to cloud storage and robust malware protection.

However, many would argue that the main point of a VPN is to maximize privacy and engender trust among users — something I wholeheartedly agree with. And ExpressVPN simply has a better track record of privacy and transparency. While NordVPN has undergone four independent audits in its history, ExpressVPN went through 12 audits in 2022 alone.

Both services use AES-256 encryption and RAM-only servers to wipe data after each server reboot, thereby increasing data privacy. But ExpressVPN goes even further by using its own signature TrustedServer technology. This system reloads the latest software stack, OS and all, with each reboot, eliminating the chance for bugs and inconsistencies across servers which could lead to VPN vulnerabilities.

Despite the slight numerical feature advantage of NordVPN, the unparalleled transparency and privacy features of ExpressVPN give it the edge here — it’s second only to Mullvad in our privacy rankings.

Best for streaming: ExpressVPN

VPNs are mainly used for privacy and security, but they can also be used for entertainment purposes, unblocking geo-restricted content. Whether you’re traveling or just want to access region-locked content — looking at you, Netflix England’s entire selection of Ghibli movies — using a VPN to spoof your location is a great way to watch all of the content you want no matter your physical location.

In my testing, both ExpressVPN and NordVPN came through with flying colors when attempting to access streaming services in different locations. They successfully unblocked Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, Disney Plus, Amazon Prime, and a handful of other services as well. 

The differences in streaming performance lie mostly in the different app interfaces. I personally found that ExpressVPN’s apps (Windows, AppleTV, Fire TV, etc.) were a bit more intuitive and easier to use than NordVPN’s apps. It might be a personal preference here, but I’m going to give the win in streaming to ExpressVPN — but, again, only by the narrowest of margins.

Bottom line

You can’t really go wrong with either of these VPNs. I gave both ExpressVPN and NordVPN 4.5 out of 5 stars in their respective reviews and both garnered Editors’ Choice awards for their outstanding VPN services. That being said, ExpressVPN is our pick for best VPN overall and for good reason. It provides excellent security features, top-notch speeds, terrific geo-unblocking, a great user interface, and incomparable transparency.

NordVPN is the fastest VPN on the market and does provide some nice-to-haves that ExpressVPN does not. But the speed difference is negligible and these extra features are really only useful for power users. Still, whenever someone asks me for a VPN recommendation I usually turn to ExpressVPN first.