You sit there for a minute or two trying a bunch of servers one by one until one of them works. There’s no feature like in the VPN router or in the desktop client to automatically connect to one of your favorite servers.
Sometimes it’ll work if you try a few times, so maybe the app should just do this? Connecting to a server sometimes shows random error messages like “IPC Error”. The app apparently can’t distinguish between the VPN switching to off because it dropped the connection, and because the user hit the Off switch: it tries to reconnect in both cases. Turning on the “reconnect VPN” makes it nearly impossible to turn off the VPN. When that happens, the only way to fix it so you can use your internet again is apparently to restart your phone, or in some cases to uninstall the VPN profile. Quite often the app gets stuck on the login screen. (Edit: even with version 2.2.4, the latest version as of early December 2019, these issues persist) Even though servers regularly stop working - presumably blocked by the Firewall - they’re almost always quickly replaced. Overall not a bad vpn and one of the few that still work in China, but i expect more and better speed for a paid product.Īs of 2019, the Astrill VPN service is one of the more reliable in China. I don’t mind switching my vpn on and off depends on what website/app i use, but if you have the function for it to do the work, make sure it actually does work. The speed test function on laptop version has failed to load any server at all, and the smart mode on the phones don’t work either. 8 out of 10 don’t work, 10-15% chance it’ll be spotty and slow, and you get 5% it’ll actually work. Ever since we started paying for the yearly subscription service (have been for a year now), it constantly disconnects, often you’ll have to scroll through and try every single server just to find one that will actually connect.
When we first started using i think there was a trial and it was absolutely amazing, fast and never had any connection issues. It’s not a bad vpn in China right now but the connection hasn’t been as good.
Can’t count how many times i wanted to smash my phone because of the vpn and i don’t even have anger issues.