106 MACWORLD OCTOBER 2019
WORKINGMAC REVIEW: HIDE.MEmmm
Hide.me
PROS- Easy-to-use Mac app.
- No-logs promise.
CONS - Expensive.
- Speeds not as good on
Mac.
PRICE
$120
COMPANY
Eventure Limited
on a Windows PC. But for Mac, Hide.me
kept about 18.32 percent of the base
speed over three days of testing. That’s
quite low, though there were bright spots
such as the German and U.S. connections.
Also, Hide.me’s servers hit
higher speeds quite often, but
couldn’t sustain them for the
duration of the test. At one point,
for example, the U.S. connection
was hitting 41Mbps before
dropping down to 28Mbps for the
final score.
HIDE.ME PRICING
Hide.me offers two pricing plans.
The Plus plan costs $60 per year
and allows for a single device
connection and limits you to
75GB of data transfer, while the
Premium plan at $10 per month
allows for five simultaneous
device connections.
If the Plus plan’s annual rate is
too much at once you can also
pay $10 per month or $40 for six
months. Obviously, the annual
rate is the better value by far.
Premium’s options beyond the
annual fee include $80 for six
months or $20 per month.
Hide.me accepts payments
via credit card, PayPal, and
cryptocurrencies.BOTTOM LINE
Hide.me is a pretty good service. It has
the right privacy promises, fair pricing,
accepts a range of payment methods,
and doesn’t ask for much in the
way of personal information.
We have seen better speeds,
however. The connections are
serviceable and will work well
enough for common uses
such as video streaming,
email, and general web surfing.
Anyone who needs better
speeds for gaming and other
uses on Mac should probably
look elsewhere. ■Hide.me’s protocol options.