Surfshark vs PIA in 2022: Detailed VPN Comparison

Surfshark and Private Internet Access (PIA) are two of the most affordable virtual private networks (if not the cheapest) in the industry. However, despite sitting on the lower end of the pricing spectrum, their capabilities vary. In this Surfshark vs PIA throw down, we’ll dissect the VPN providers to help you pick one that best meets your needs.

Key Takeaways:

• Surfshark is better than Private Internet Access in four categories: speed, streaming, torrenting and customer support. 
• Both Surfshark and Private Internet Access are on equal footing on the security, privacy and user-friendliness fronts.
• PIA is better than Surfshark in three categories: features, pricing and server locations. 

To see what sets PIA and Surfshark apart, you have to rigorously test each VPN, which can be a lengthy and time-consuming process. We did the legwork for you and prepared a Surfshark VPN vs Private Internet Access comparison summary to help you make a quick yet informed decision. If you just want a quick answer, Surfshark wins, but only just.

• Is Surfshark Better Than PIA?

  Surfshark surpasses PIA performance in speed, streaming, torrenting and customer support. Moreover, it equals Private Internet Access in security, privacy and user-friendliness.

• Is Surfshark Trustworthy?

  Surfshark is a trustworthy VPN that has never had any incident of security or privacy breach.

• Is PIA VPN a Strong VPN?

  Yes, PIA is a strong VPN that offers solid security and privacy.

	Visit Surfshark	Visit Private Internet Access
	$2.49 / month (All Plans)30-day money-back guarantee	$2.19 / month (All Plans)30-day money-back guarantee
	Surfshark Review	Private Internet Access Review
General
Payment methods	PayPal, Credit card, Google Pay, Amazon Pay	PayPal, Credit card
Accepts cryptocurrency
Simultaneous connections	Unlimited	10
Supports split tunneling
Unlimited bandwidth
Free trial available		Only on Android/iOS apps
Refund period
Worldwide server amount	3200+ servers in 65 countries	servers in 78 countries (no exact data)
Desktop OSes	Windows, MacOS, Linux, Xbox, Playstation	Windows, MacOS, Linux
Mobile OSes	Android, iOS, FireTV, AppleTV	Android, iOS
Browser extensions	Chrome, Firefox	Chrome, Firefox, Opera
Can be installed on routers
Streaming
Can access Netflix US
Can access BBC iPlayer
Can access Hulu
Can access Amazon Prime Video
Security
Encryption types	256-AES	128-AES, 256-AES
VPN protocols available	OpenVPN, IKEv2, WireGuard	IPSec, OpenVPN, WireGuard
Enabled at device startup
Allows torrenting
No-logging policy
Passed DNS leak test
Killswitch available
Malware/ad blocker included
Support
Live Chat	24/7	24/7
Email support	24/7	24/7
Phone support
User forum
Knowledgebase

Surfshark vs PIA Detailed Comparison & Testing

Our Surfshark vs PIA VPN comparison is a bit like a nine-round boxing match. Each round represents a key VPN aspect such as speed, pricing, features, security, privacy, streaming and more. 

We’ll put the VPN services through a barrage of tests and evaluations in each round, and weigh their performances. The VPN that delivers the best performance will get a point, and in case a tie occurs, both services will get a point. We’ll tally the points at the end of the final round, and the VPN with the most points will be our winner.

1. Speed

While a VPN service slows down your connection, the fastest VPNs ensure that the impact on upload and download speed is minimal. They maintain good internet speeds, allowing you to enjoy interruption-free streaming, torrenting, online gaming and browsing. We did a batch of speed tests to see how Surfshark stacks up against PIA on this front.

Surfshark vs Private Internet Access Speed Test Results

We’ve always acclaimed Surfshark for its admirable speeds, and our results suggest its speed hasn’t let up. It has the third best upload speeds on the market — falling behind only Speedify and ExpressVPN, in that order (check out our ExpressVPN review and Speedify review for more info). While its download speed and latency aren’t the best you’ll ever see, it’s still one of the best VPNs for gaming.

Private Internet Access’ performance in this category is appalling, to say the least. While its upload speeds are comparable to those of Surfshark, it falls flat on the download and latency fronts. PIA only hit 56% of our unprotected internet download speeds and increased latency by a whopping 114%. 

This round is clear-cut. Surfshark is the undisputed winner as it outperforms PIA on all three speed fronts: download, upload and latency.

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2. Features

If you’ve already ruled out Private Internet Access because of its poor speeds, its features might change your mind. Like Surfshark, PIA comes packed with all the essential VPN features and spruces up its core with premium add-ons. 

PIA vs Surfshark VPN OS Support

PIA and Surfshark offer native apps for Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Linux operating systems (OSes). The VPN services also work seamlessly with smart TVs (such as Apple TV), gaming consoles, routers and major web browsers such as Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox.

You can install both Surfshark and PIA on as many devices as you like. However, you can only set up 10 simultaneous connections with PIA. Surfshark lets you have unlimited simultaneous connections.

Internet Kill Switch and Split Tunneling

Surfshark has the most basic form of a kill switch that cuts off your device from the internet when the VPN connection drops. PIA has a similar tool as well as an advanced kill switch that prevents you from connecting to the internet unless the VPN is active.

Both providers support app- and IP-based split tunneling. In addition, Surfshark supports URL-based split tunneling. However, PIA split tunneling is available for desktop and Android OSes, whereas Surfshark works on Windows and Android only.

Additional VPN Features

Beyond the commonplace features, the VPN providers come packed with advanced security features, some of which are paid add-ons. First among these is the ad blocker, which is available from PIA as PIA MACE and from Surfshark as CleanWeb.

They also offer antivirus tools as paid add-ons, namely SurfsharkONE and Antivirus by PIA. In addition, PIA has an Identity Guard — an email breach monitor available in the client control panel. The tool scans and monitors your email address to see if it has ever been part of a known data breach.

Surfshark and PIA offer all the standard features and strengthen that suite with bells and whistles. They have all the features you want in a modern VPN, and that makes it difficult to separate them on this front. However, the presence of Identity Guard and Surfshark’s lack of split tunneling in macOS tips the odds in favor of PIA.

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3. Pricing

As we’ve seen, the providers come with the fundamental VPN features and are equally endowed with advanced features. In this section, we’ll add money to the equation to find out the value you get with each VPN.

Surfshark and PIA pricing Comparison

If affordability was to sway your decision, there’s no doubt you’d edge toward PIA. Its monthly plan is $3 cheaper than Surfshark’s, and the extended plans offer big discounts. For example, the three-year plan costs $2.03 per month (if you include the three free months), which represents an 80% discount. Surfshark is also affordable, but can’t match the pricing set by PIA.

Beyond the base pricing, both VPN providers charge additional fees for their add-on features. Surfshark One, for example, will set you back $1.49 per month. On the other hand, the amount you cough up for PIA add-ons depends on the length of subscription.

Free Trial and Money-Back Guarantee

Mobile and Mac users get a seven-day trial with Surfshark. PIA has a seven-day trial too, but it’s only available on mobile devices. However, the lack of a free trial on Windows shouldn’t worry you because both VPN services offer a 30-day money-back guarantee.

If you have read our other Surfshark VPN comparisons, you already know that the provider always dominates this category. In this review, though, Surfshark has met its match, and there’s no denying that PIA is the cheaper VPN. As a result, PIA takes the point to surge ahead of Surfshark in our matchup.

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4. Security & Privacy

Before you fork out the cash and invest in a VPN, you have to examine how secure it is. When it comes to VPN security, the quality of the VPN protocols and encryption standards dictate its strength.

Surfshark lets you choose between OpenVPN (UDP and TCP), WireGuard and IKEv2 for your VPN protocol. All these protocols use AES 256-bit encryption (read our encryption guide to learn more).

PIA, by contrast, uses OpenVPN out of the box, but you can change that to WireGuard on all platforms, plus IKEv2 on iOS. If your internet connection isn’t stable, PIA lets you decrease the packet size for optimal VPN performance.

Additional Security Features

While both offer multi-hop features, they function differently. Surfshark multi-hop sends your traffic through two VPN servers, whereas PIA multi-hop reroutes your VPN traffic through a proxy. 

Additionally, the two providers support obfuscation, a technology that makes your VPN traffic look like normal internet traffic. Beyond that, Surfshark has the unique NoBorders mode which enables you to access censored content in restrictive countries. 

Surfshark & Private Internet Access No-Logs Policies

Surfshark and PIA remain true to their strict no-logs policies, meaning they don’t collect, store or share user data, traffic logs, IP addresses or information about the websites you visit.

However, Surfshark does log user ID and connection timestamps related to the VPN server you connect to. Thankfully, the provider expunges that information after 15 minutes. PIA, on the other hand, keeps your payment information and email address, which it claims to use to keep the service running. 

The two providers offer strong security, with solid VPN protocols, encryption standards and an excellent set of advanced security features. In addition, they adhere to a strict no-logs policy and have had no instance of a security breach in the past. Taking all factors into consideration, the VPNs are comparable in this category and a tie is a fair result. 

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5. Streaming

The best VPN for streaming offers excellent download speeds and the ability to unblock streaming services. However, speed only becomes relevant after you get into the streaming service, so the real question is, do these VPNs unblock the right platforms?

Private Internet Access streaming is a mixed bag. We had to switch between servers to find one that could unblock the U.S. streaming services. After multiple attempts, we were able to get into Amazon Prime Video and Disney Plus. Sadly, we couldn’t find a way around HBO Max and BBC iPlayer geoblocking.

Surfshark did a better job, getting us into Disney Plus on the first attempt. However, it took us several attempts to find our way into Amazon Prime Video, BBC iPlayer and HBO Max.

Can Surfshark VPN or PIA Unblock Netflix?

Both Surfshark and PIA are adept at Netflix streaming. The only issue is that they take several attempts to unblock this platform, but beyond that streaming is smooth sailing. Videos take a while to load with PIA, which is in line with its sluggish download speeds. Interestingly, once they load, the picture quality is good, and buffering is a non-issue.

Surfshark and PIA aren’t the best streaming VPNs. However, among their frailties, Surfshark has an edge as it unblocks HBO Max and BBC iPlayer — two streaming services PIA can’t unblock. As a result, Surfshark wins.

6. Torrenting

The best torrenting VPN should have fast download speeds and solid online security. Surfshark and PIA meet the latter criteria, but their download speeds aren’t the best. We downloaded a 1GB test torrent file using a 3 Mbps internet connection to see how they compare.

Given PIA’s crawling download speeds, we expected it to falter in our torrent download tests. Surprisingly, the VPN delivered a decent performance, with top download speeds of 0.38 MB per second. Despite PIA’s best effort, it took 83 minutes to complete the torrent download, compared to Surfshark’s time of 75 minutes. As a result, Surfshark takes the point here.

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7. Server Locations

As always, we evaluate VPN server performance through two lenses: server count and geographical diversity. We give more weight to the geographical distribution, because the wider it is, the bigger the pool of country-specific IP addresses you have. A bigger server count, on the other hand, means you have more server options in a specific region.

Surfshark hasn’t been in the VPN industry for long, but it has already amassed more than 3,200 servers, which is impressive. The provider offers VPN servers in more than 65 countries, including some overlooked regions such as Africa and the Middle East.

PIA doesn’t publicize the total number of servers in its fleet. We contacted PIA support on the same, but the agent didn’t disclose the exact number. The last time PIA published its number, it had over 3,400 servers, but whether the number of VPN servers has increased or decreased remains an open question. PIA has VPN servers in 84 countries with the largest portion being in the U.S.

Besides the regular servers, PIA also offers dedicated IP servers, albeit at an extra cost (see our pricing section). Surfshark, on the other hand, has static IP servers, but those are available for free. Read our dedicated vs shared vs static IP guide to learn more.

Assuming PIA has maintained its fleet of servers at 3,400, then it means the provider outperforms Surfshark on this front. Moreover, PIA has VPN servers in 19 more countries than Surfshark. For these reasons, we give PIA the accolade and a point in this category. 

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8. User-Friendliness

Besides offering the right features, a VPN should flatten the learning curve to enable you to make the most of its capabilities. In this section, we turn our attention to the subjective realm of user-friendliness to see how easy (or difficult) it is to use these VPNs. 

We begin on a bright note: Both Surfshark and PIA sport a modern-looking, no-frills user interface (UI). The desktop apps open to a neat UI, with clearly labeled items so you don’t have to guess your way around it. You can search for the server you want to connect to by country name or scroll through the entire list of server locations.

Beyond that, altering the default settings of either Surfshark or PIA is also a cinch from the “settings” tab. Every setting is intuitively placed and takes the touch of a button to turn on or off features like the kill switch, split tunneling and auto-connect.

VPN Service Mobile Apps

Surfshark’s Android app is as powerful and easy to use as the desktop version. It comes with all the features including a kill switch and split tunneling. The iOS app mirrors the desktop’s ease of use, but lacks a split tunneling feature.

PIA mobile apps outperform the desktop version in terms of ease of use. For example, the Android app adds a “quick settings” option in the main window to help instantly access and configure features such as the VPN kill switch and automation. The iOS app is easy to use too, and has additional features such as the IKEv2 protocol.

Both Surfshark and PIA are super easy to use, even for beginners. You won’t struggle to connect to a VPN server or tweak the settings to suit your preferences. Since the two providers exhibit no frailty in this category, we’re obliged to declare a tie and hand them a point apiece.

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9. Customer Support

Surfshark and PIA have self-service options to help you find solutions to some issues on your own. They both offer a knowledgebase and FAQs, with a library of helpful articles and guidelines to cover most of the billing, installation and technical issues. 

Beyond that, they offer live chat support that works best if you have a problem that requires an immediate human agent touch. We contacted each support team via live chat, and they both offered satisfactory responses. However, PIA agents took a little longer than Surfshark to respond to our questions and weren’t as well versed on the topics.

In addition, Surfshark and PIA offer email ticket support. The ticket support is ideal when you want to engage the agents on a deeper level and attach screenshots to the problem you’re facing. Unfortunately, though, the two providers don’t offer phone support.

By looking at the available options, it’s difficult to separate PIA and Surfshark because they offer similar support options: live chat, knowledgebase, FAQs and email support. However, the sluggish response of PIA agents on live chat is a strike against the service, and it tips the odds in Surfshark’s favor. 

The Verdict

Our Surfshark vs Private Internet Access matchup was decided by the slimmest of margins. Surfshark garnered six points, compared to the PIA tally of five; however, there’s more to the bout than the total scores.

Both PIA and Surfshark exchanged equal blows in two categories: security and user-friendliness. PIA outperformed Surfshark in features, pricing and server locations. On the other hand, Surfshark got the better of PIA in speed, streaming, torrenting and customer support.

The decision as to which VPN to subscribe to depends on your needs. If you want to stream movies or download torrents, Surfshark is the safer bet. However, to unblock geo-restricted content across the globe, PIA gives you better options.

What do you think of our Surfshark vs PIA comparison? Have you used these services before? Is there a category you think the providers won, drew or lost unfairly? We’d like to hear about it. As always, thanks for reading.

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