Pawan Purohit
Most people don’t start using a VPN because they planned to. It often occurs in a fleeting moment of unease. You connect to public Wi-Fi at an airport or cafe. A website behaves oddly. A streaming app suddenly looks different. Or someone casually says, “You should probably be using a VPN,” without explaining what that actually means.
So you download one, tap Connect, see a reassuring green icon, and move on.
That quiet sense of relief is understandable. It’s also where most misunderstandings begin.
VPNs are genuinely useful tools. But they’re often trusted for the wrong reasons and blamed for problems they were never meant to solve. Some people expect them to provide anonymity. Others assume they magically fix privacy, security, and tracking all at once. When reality doesn’t match those expectations, VPNs are either disabled out of frustration or relied on far more than they should be.
Knowing how to use a VPN properly starts with understanding its limits.
Why VPN Confusion Is So Common
Part of the problem is how VPNs are usually explained.
They’re marketed as shields, cloaks, or invisibility layers. At the same time, the technical explanations of encryption, tunnelling, and protocols feel abstract and disconnected from everyday use. The gap between marketing promises and lived experience creates confusion.
In practice, a VPN does something very specific. Once that’s clear, most of the myths disappear on their own.
What Really Changes When You Turn a VPN On
When a VPN connects, it doesn’t wrap your entire digital life in secrecy. It does something far more focused.
It creates an encrypted tunnel between your device and a VPN server somewhere else. The data moving through that tunnel can’t be easily inspected by people sharing the same network. This matters most on connections you don’t control, such as public Wi-Fi, hotel networks, and shared offices, where you have no idea who else is connected or how traffic is handled.
Your internet provider also stops seeing the individual websites you visit. From their perspective, you’re connected to a VPN server, not browsing page by page.
That’s the core benefit. And it’s a meaningful one. But the edges of that protection matter just as much.
Websites still recognise you when you log in. Apps still know who you are. Cookies, trackers, and browser fingerprints don’t disappear because your IP address changes. A VPN protects the path your data takes, not the identity you carry with you online.
Once you see a VPN as a secure tunnel rather than a disguise, everything else makes more sense.
Choose the Right VPN Protocol
Most modern VPN apps let you choose a “protocol”. You don’t need to understand cryptography, but you should know this:
- WireGuard: Best balance of speed and security for most users
- OpenVPN: Reliable, slightly slower, widely supported
- IKEv2: Good for mobile devices switching networks
If your app defaults to WireGuard or “Automatic,” that’s usually fine. Avoid apps that don’t clearly state which protocol they use.
When Using a VPN Actually Helps
VPNs shine in situations where the network itself can’t be trusted.
Public Wi-Fi is the most obvious example. Cafes, airports, and hotels are convenient, but they’re also shared by dozens, sometimes hundreds, of strangers. Even if nothing malicious is happening, you’re still handing your traffic to infrastructure you know nothing about.
VPNs are also useful when you want to prevent your internet provider from building a detailed picture of your browsing habits, or when you’re accessing content that’s restricted by region.
In these situations, a VPN adds a layer of protection that would otherwise be missing.
When a VPN Is Mostly Unnecessary
At home, on a network you control, the benefits shrink.
Modern websites, especially banking and payment services, already use strong encryption. Turning on a VPN doesn’t suddenly make it “more secure.” In some cases, it can even trigger extra verification steps or cause apps to behave strangely.
This is why running a VPN all the time isn’t a rule. It’s a choice. For many people, using a VPN selectively makes more sense than leaving it on permanently.
A Quiet Setting That Matters More Than It Sounds
Most VPN apps include something called a kill switch. It doesn’t get much attention, but it plays an important role.
VPN connections aren’t perfectly stable. They can drop briefly when you move between networks or lose signal. Without a kill switch, your device may fall back to a regular connection for a moment, sending traffic outside the encrypted tunnel without you noticing.
For people who rely on public Wi-Fi or want consistent protection, a kill switch is reassuring. For others, especially those who value uninterrupted connectivity, it can feel restrictive.
There’s no universal right choice here. It’s about understanding the trade-off rather than blindly enabling every setting.
The Reality Behind “No-Logs” Promises
Nearly every VPN claims to keep no logs. On its own, that phrase doesn’t tell you much.
What matters is what isn’t logged, how the company defines logging, and whether those policies have ever been tested in the real world. Some VPNs keep minimal operational data. Others store more than users expect, even if they avoid storing browsing histories.
A VPN doesn’t need to be perfect to be useful. But it does need to be honest. Treat “no-logs” as a starting point for scrutiny, not a guarantee of anonymity.
Why VPNs Often Feel Like They “Break” Things
Many frustrations blamed on VPNs come from expectations rather than flaws.
People expect VPNs to block ads, stop tracking, or hide them completely. When websites still recognise them, or streaming apps refuse to load, it feels like something has gone wrong.
In reality, the VPN is doing exactly what it was designed to do—encrypt traffic and route it differently. It just isn’t designed to solve every privacy or security problem.
Understanding this saves a lot of unnecessary tweaking.
Where VPNs Stop Being Enough
A VPN can protect your connection. It can’t protect your decisions.
If you log into accounts tied to your real identity, that identity follows you. If your device is infected with malware, a VPN won’t fix it. If you reuse passwords or install untrusted browser extensions, the weakest link isn’t the network; it’s the setup.
Privacy works in layers. A VPN is one of them, not the foundation.
A More Useful Way to Think About VPNs
A VPN isn’t invisibility. It isn’t anonymity. And it isn’t a security cure-all. It’s a tool that makes certain situations safer and others largely unchanged.
Used deliberately on networks you don’t trust, for purposes that make sense, it does its job quietly and well. Used blindly, it either disappoints or creates a false sense of confidence.
Once you understand that balance, VPNs stop feeling mysterious. They become what they were always meant to be: practical, limited, and useful in the right moments.
