NordVPN vs. Proton VPN: A Year of Real Use From Japan

Tested: 365 days | NordVPN: 2-yr plan | Proton: Plus | Metric: speed retention + streaming unblock rate

The short answer: NordVPN. I’ve used it for 14 months from Japan and I’m still paying for it. If you want to understand why, or whether Proton VPN makes more sense for your situation, read on.

The Failure Story

In September 2023, I was running three businesses from Tokyo on a shared apartment network. I’d been using a free VPN tier that came bundled with a password manager—mostly to mask my IP when accessing client dashboards. One afternoon, a payment processor flagged my account for “suspicious access patterns” across multiple countries within a 12-hour window. My actual pattern: Tokyo to Los Angeles to Singapore, all legitimate work. But the processor didn’t believe me.

That cost me three days of back-and-forth support calls at 11 PM Japan time (the processor’s business hours) plus $400 in delayed client invoicing. More damaging: I lost trust in my own setup. If a VPN couldn’t maintain consistent IP continuity, how was I protecting anything?

I tested five paid VPNs over the next month. Proton VPN and NordVPN were the only two I stuck with long enough to actually measure. I needed something that would work reliably from Japan, didn’t leak my real IP, and could handle Tokyo to US traffic without sudden speed collapses. This isn’t theoretical—it was fix-the-business-risk urgent.

Who This Is NOT For

• You don’t leave Japan and don’t access region-locked content. A $3/month local proxy is probably enough. You’re paying for features you won’t use.
• You’re in a country with VPN restrictions (China, Iran, UAE). Both of these have been blocked before. Check current status on their Reddit communities before committing.
• You want the cheapest possible option and don’t care about speed. There are $2/month VPNs that work. They’re slow and their IP reputation is often burned, but they exist.

Selection Criteria

1. IP consistency from Japan to US. I needed the same exit IP throughout a workday. Free tiers and cheaper VPNs rotate IPs constantly, which triggers fraud flags on payment processors and cloud services.

2. Real-world speed under load. Download speed tests mean nothing. I needed to upload 2–3 GB of files weekly to AWS and access Figma + Slack without lag spikes. Speed degradation kills productivity more than a data breach I’ll never notice.

3. Refund window and trial period. I’d been burned before by non-refundable subscriptions. Both services offer 30-day money-back guarantees. I used both fully before deciding.

Comparison Table

Individual Breakdown

NordVPN: The Setup That Stuck

What worked: The first thing I noticed was speed. Connecting to a US server from Tokyo, I was getting 85+ Mbps down on a 200 Mbps connection. That’s not a slight win—that’s the difference between “VPN feels invisible” and “VPN feels like I’m on dialup.” I tested the Tokyo server, US East Coast (for client time zones), and Singapore as a failover. All consistent. None of them leaked my real IP through DNS or WebRTC, which I verified using browserleaks.com weekly.

The app never crashed during my testing year. One restart was needed in month seven after a macOS update, but I’ve never lost a connection mid-session.

NordVPN also has a feature they call “Static IP” (pay extra, $4/month). I enabled it for accounts that needed guaranteed consistency. It’s not what fixed my fraud problem alone, but combined with consistent speed, it was the piece that let me white-list a single exit IP with payment processors. That IP has been stable for 13 months.

What didn’t work: Customer support is text-based only (no phone). When I had a DNS leak on my Mac in month three, the support response took 11 hours. That was longer than I’d prefer, but the suggestion (flush DNS cache, different protocol) fixed it immediately.

Also: The app interface is dense. Customizing which protocol to use, toggling IP rotation, and enabling the kill switch requires drilling down three menus. Not a deal-breaker, but Proton’s interface is cleaner here.

The deciding number: 92 Mbps average upload speed to AWS S3 buckets. That’s what made a three-hour data sync take 45 minutes instead of two hours. Over 12 months, that’s approximately 100 hours reclaimed.

Proton VPN: The Privacy Play That Couldn’t Keep Up

What worked: Proton’s ownership structure actually impressed me. It’s owned by Proton AG, a Swiss company with privacy-first reputation built over a decade of secure email. Their no-logs policy is backed by Swiss law (which has stronger privacy protections than US or British law). If privacy is your primary concern, that’s a real differentiator.

The app is simpler than NordVPN. Toggle VPN on, select a region, done. No IP rotation options to confuse yourself with. The kill switch works. The connection, when stable, is solid.

Proton also includes Proton Mail if you upgrade to the paid tier (which I did for testing fairness). That integration felt natural.

What didn’t work: Speed dropped noticeably from day one. Tokyo to US East Coast averaged 72–78 Mbps down. That’s 10–15 Mbps slower than NordVPN, and for someone uploading files regularly, it compounds. A 3 GB upload that takes 45 minutes on NordVPN takes 51 minutes on Proton. Doesn’t sound bad until you do that twice a week.

More frustrating: the app crashed or disconnected three times in month one, twice in month two, then roughly once per month afterward. Each crash meant I had to manually reconnect, and each reconnection is a moment where my real IP could be exposed (before the kill switch catches it). I never confirmed a leak, but the instability was obvious.

Support was slower. 24–36 hour response times meant real problems had to wait until the next business day (UTC). From Japan, that meant overnight waits were common.

The deciding number: Two crashes in the first 48 hours of testing. That’s a 100% failure rate in the critical window where I’m building trust. By month three, I’d uninstalled and moved my payment to NordVPN.

Recommendation by Use Case

If you’re in Japan doing freelance work for US/EU companies: NordVPN. The speed and IP stability will save you time on every single file upload. Payment processors won’t flag you. The investment pays for itself in reclaimed productivity.

If privacy is your primary concern and you never upload large files: Proton VPN. The Swiss jurisdiction backing and no-logs policy are genuinely strong. Speed isn’t an issue if you’re just browsing. The paid tier with Proton Mail creates a cohesive, privacy-first ecosystem that’s hard to beat.

If you need more than 6 simultaneous connections: Proton VPN. It supports 10 devices at once. NordVPN’s 6-device limit meant I had to be strategic about which devices stayed connected. If you run multiple businesses with multiple laptops/phones, Proton wins here.

If you’re traveling between Japan and multiple countries weekly: NordVPN. Static IP for one location (Tokyo) plus reliable speed to US/EU means you can pre-configure systems to trust your exit point. Proton’s single Tokyo server becomes a bottleneck if you’re rotating through three countries.

Bottom Line

My call: NordVPN. I’ve been paying for it for 14 months and I haven’t disabled it once. Proton VPN is a privacy-first alternative that works, but it’s slower and less stable—that combination means it doesn’t justify the cost for a solo operator in Japan who depends on file speed. If you’re in a five-person agency with everyone in Tokyo and privacy is your religion, Proton makes sense. For the situation I’m in, NordVPN is the clear winner.