Disclaimer: Installation and use of any software made by third party developers is at your own discretion and liability. We share our best practices with third party software but do not provide customer support for them.
*** The OpenVPN client version may slightly differ than shown in the following examples; please use the most recent version available through the OpenVPN Downloads page, as linked below. ***
- Visit the official download page for the Windows OpenVPN Installer,
located here: https://openvpn.net/index.php/open-source/downloads.html
- Choose the version that matches the operating system you're using (whether 32-bit, or 64-bit)
- Choose to Save the file.
- Go the the Downloads link in your browser, and click the option to
open the folder containing the download.
- Right-click on the installer, and choose Run as Administrator.
- You may receive a popup from the User Account Control on Windows; if so, choose Yes to proceed with the installation.
- When the Install completes, click Next
- Uncheck Show Readme and click Finish
- Download the OpenVPN Configuration Files here: https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/openvpn/openvpn.zip
- Open the folder that the configuration file was downloaded to
- Right-Click the openvpn.zip and click Extract All
- Click Extract
- Highlight and copy all of the Extracted files from the zip and paste them into the OpenVPN config folder C:\Program Files\OpenVPN\config or C:\Program Files (x86)\OpenVPN\config
- When you Paste, it will ask you to confirm Administrator permission to copy the files.
- Right-Click the OpenVPN GUI icon on your desktop, and choose Run as administrator
- Right-click the OpenVPN icon in the System Tray to choose a region to connect to, or to disconnect from the VPN.
- Enter your Username and password when prompted, and Click OK.
EASY Setup Guides for Alternate Configurations (Advanced):
If you need encryption, please use the Private Internet Application or OpenVPN protocol with our service.
- Windows OpenVPN Setup
- macOS OpenVPN Setup
- macOS Viscosity Setup
- Ubuntu OpenVPN Setup
- Fedora OpenVPN Setup
- Robolinux 7.5.3 OpenVPN Setup
- iOS (iPad/iPhone/iTouch) OpenVPN Setup
- Android 4.0+ OpenVPN Setup
- DD-WRT OpenVPN Setup
- Tomato OpenVPN Setup
- PfSense OpenVPN Setup
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OpenVPN Configuration Files (Recommended Default)
OpenVPN Configuration Files (Recommended Default windows only plus block-outside-dns)
OpenVPN Configuration Files (Strong)
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Although quite different from a VPN, we provide a SOCKS5 Proxy with all accounts in the event users require this feature.
SOCKS5 Proxy Usage Guides
proxy-nl.privateinternetaccess.com port 1080
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Enable port forwarding in the application by entering the Advanced area, enabling port forwarding and selecting one of the following gateways:
After enabling port forwarding and re-connecting to one of the above gateways, please hover your mouse over the System Tray or Menu Bar icon to reveal the tooltip which will display the port number. You can then enter this port into your software.
Port Forwarding reduces privacy. For maximum privacy, please keep port forwarding disabled.
- IPv6 leak protection disables IPv6 traffic while on the VPN. This ensures that no IPv6 traffic leaks out over your normal internet connection when you are connected to the VPN. This includes 6to4 and Teredo tunneled IPv6 traffic.
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The dns leak protection feature activates VPN dns leak protection. This ensures that DNS requests are routed through the VPN. This enables the greatest level of privacy and security but may cause connectivity issues in non-standard network configurations.
This can be enabled and disabled in the Windows application, while it is enabled by default on our macOS application.
We use our own private DNS servers for your DNS queries while on the VPN. After connecting we set your operating system's DNS servers to 209.222.18.222 and 209.222.18.218. When using a DNS Leak testing site you should expect to see your DNS requests originate from the IP of the VPN gateway you are connected to.
If you change your DNS servers manually or if for some other reason they are changed this does not necessarily mean your DNS is leaking. Even if you use different DNS servers the queries will still be routed through the VPN connection and will be anonymous.
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The internet kill switch activates VPN disconnect protection. If you disconnect from the VPN, your internet access will stop working. It will reactivate normal internet access when you deactivate the kill switch mode or exit the application.
Users who may be connected to two connections simultaneously (ex.: wired and wireless) should not use this feature, as it will only stop 1 active connection type.
