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Best and Fast VPN for China ?

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Old May 24, 2019, 11:11 am
FlyerTalk Forums Expert How-Tos and Guides
Last edit by: moondog
If you want to use sites like Google, FB, and Twitter in China, you need a means to bypass government imposed blocks.

Roaming on your home country's network works like a charm, but this can be slow and/or expensive.

Most of us use VPNs or Shadowsocks (the latter requires a bit more legwork because you need to find, and pay for, a good server on your own you want good results).

While this topic is not illegal, we have definitely noticed that over plugging solutions that work well often results in diminished performance (because this makes them targets).

As such, my hope is that we can refrain from using buzzwords or complete company names in this thread. By way of example, "E" is impossible to catch via search, while the company name is easy.
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Best and Fast VPN for China ?

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Old Apr 25, 2019, 7:35 am
  #121  
 
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Did anyone try buyvpn.com ? i see that they used to sell proxies for a long time
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Old Apr 25, 2019, 9:31 am
  #122  
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I've honestly simply given up this week. This means that I can't email clients (i.e. our company email is Google), or use Google, but I have Wechat and Yahoo.
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Old Apr 25, 2019, 5:45 pm
  #123  
 
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Originally Posted by moondog
I've honestly simply given up this week. This means that I can't email clients (i.e. our company email is Google), or use Google, but I have Wechat and Yahoo.
What is the cost of an internet line with direct international access (say to HK or something like that)? Are we talking 4 figures in USD/month? 5 figures?
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Old Apr 25, 2019, 6:00 pm
  #124  
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Originally Posted by STS-134
What is the cost of an internet line with direct international access (say to HK or something like that)? Are we talking 4 figures in USD/month? 5 figures?
I want to say $500 per month can support 10 people. The thing is, SS costs much less, and still works.

On a semi related note, Exp has completely stopped responding to my chats (I try my best to refrain from annoying them; I just want to know which servers to use). As such, I'm thinking the current situation might be serious.
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Old Apr 25, 2019, 10:59 pm
  #125  
 
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Anyone else having trouble accessing Wikipedia? Two provinces this week and both PC site and phone app do not seem to be responding without VPN.
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Old Apr 26, 2019, 12:54 am
  #126  
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Originally Posted by uanj
Anyone else having trouble accessing Wikipedia? Two provinces this week and both PC site and phone app do not seem to be responding without VPN.
Yes, I'm also having problems, and have started using Baidu, which honestly isn't that bad.
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Old Apr 26, 2019, 7:02 pm
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Originally Posted by moondog
I want to say $500 per month can support 10 people. The thing is, SS costs much less, and still works.
Hmm...that seems not too bad for a 10 person business for a month though. It costs about that much to keep one person around for one day (at least at an engineering company). On the other hand, paying that is like giving in to racketeering, which I find offensive in another way.

Originally Posted by moondog
Yes, I'm also having problems, and have started using Baidu, which honestly isn't that bad.
Except by doing that, you're giving in to protectionism. I can tell you that if the US started blocking all foreign search engines like Baidu in some sort of effort to force everyone to use Google (or Bing or Yahoo), then the US based search engines would be the absolute last things I'd use. Even if they happen to be the best. Just because, this type of protectionism and racketeering to get around it is NOT cool.
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Old Apr 26, 2019, 7:58 pm
  #128  
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Originally Posted by uanj
Anyone else having trouble accessing Wikipedia? Two provinces this week and both PC site and phone app do not seem to be responding without VPN.
I thought Wikipedia has been blocked for a long time. Did they quit blocking and I didn't notice?
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Old Apr 26, 2019, 9:08 pm
  #129  
 
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Originally Posted by Loren Pechtel
I thought Wikipedia has been blocked for a long time. Did they quit blocking and I didn't notice?
zh.wikipedia.org has been blocked for a long time. en.wikipedia.org was not blocked as of last week. I'm guessing it may have to do with some assumption that only more educated people and foreigners can read English.
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Old Apr 27, 2019, 6:03 am
  #130  
 
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I'm currently in Shanghai. Previously, I would subscribe to ExpressVPN for a month, then cancel once my trip came to an end. This time, however, ExpressVPN is proving unreliable, and I am using PIA, a VPN to which I am a yearly subscriber, and which had previously been completely unreliable in China. It's an ever changing scenario, dependant on internet connectivity, speed, available offshore servers, as well as the concerted and seemingly more robust attempt by the Chinese government to prevent usage of VPN's. I'm thankful that I am able to connect with family and colleagues through WhatsApp, as it makes the transfer of photos and videos easier for us.
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Old Apr 27, 2019, 3:45 pm
  #131  
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Originally Posted by flyme2
I'm currently in Shanghai. Previously, I would subscribe to ExpressVPN for a month, then cancel once my trip came to an end. This time, however, ExpressVPN is proving unreliable, and I am using PIA, a VPN to which I am a yearly subscriber, and which had previously been completely unreliable in China. It's an ever changing scenario, dependant on internet connectivity, speed, available offshore servers, as well as the concerted and seemingly more robust attempt by the Chinese government to prevent usage of VPN's. I'm thankful that I am able to connect with family and colleagues through WhatsApp, as it makes the transfer of photos and videos easier for us.
I'm currently in give up mode. This sucks because my company email is Google based, and I do like WhatsApp, but I've found that a combination of Wechat, Yahoo Mail, and Baidu keeps me somewhat functional.
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Old Apr 27, 2019, 4:22 pm
  #132  
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My ExpressVPN is also not functioning.

However my Pokefi Mifi device now has an option of purchasing a 5GB block of VPN LTE data during your China roaming for $30US valid for two years.
This is my lifeline for now.
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Old Apr 27, 2019, 4:49 pm
  #133  
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Originally Posted by tentseller
My ExpressVPN is also not functioning.

However my Pokefi Mifi device now has an option of purchasing a 5GB block of VPN LTE data during your China roaming for $30US valid for two years.
This is my lifeline for now.
Can you provide more details? I'm not sure the provider would like you do so publicly; e.g. Exp really seems to dislike public plugs these days.

FYI, I happen to be on Exp now, but is 645a on a Sunday. I currently can't count on them during business hours. My guess is that the government can sharp shoot any V servers it gets a hard on for, and Exp managed to piss them off. This is obviously a delicate business.

I really appreciate everyone's advice here, but I think it's important for us to discuss good options somewhat discretely.
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Old Apr 28, 2019, 9:35 am
  #134  
 
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Originally Posted by uanj
Anyone else having trouble accessing Wikipedia? Two provinces this week and both PC site and phone app do not seem to be responding without VPN.
Both PC and phone working today without VPN. Yay!
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Old Apr 28, 2019, 10:04 am
  #135  
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Exp seems to be semi okay now, at least in the early mornings. That having been said, there is no way in hell I would advise newcomers to get on board at this point in time (e.g. telling me to connect to a random server in Germany that is definitely slow, and might not work at all, is not cool).
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