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VPN in UAE: These are the top 5 VPNs downloaded by residents

Dubai - The UAE topped in the number of VPN users followed by Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

There are around four dozen different virtual private networks (VPNs) downloaded by the UAE residents in 2020 with top five most popular VPN apps commanding two-third of the market share.

The most downloads went to one of the leaders in the market, NordVPN, which received 17.1 per cent of total downloads at 953,980. The second spot went to SuperVPN, less known but apparently a popular service in the UAE, with 930,883 downloads, which constitutes 16.7 per cent of the total, according to the latest data shared by Atlas VPN with Khaleej Times.

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The third-place goes to HotspotShield VPN, with 817,267 downloads or 14.6 per cent of all downloads in 2020. ExpressVPN received fourth place with over 548,279 downloads, or 9.8 per cent of the total. Turbo VPN, which came fifth with 438,559 downloads on Google Play Store and Apple App Store in the UAE, represents 7.9 per cent of the combined sum of downloads.

According to Ashish Mehta & Associates, the usage of VPN in the UAE is not illegal if it is used as per the guidelines of the UAE government and Telecommunication Regulatory Authority.

The use of VPNs is the highest in Arab countries, where the top five VPN services have a penetration rate of 23.8 per cent. Based on the first half 2020 data, the UAE topped in the number of VPN users followed by Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Dh14.14m worth of VPNs bought in UAE

According to the latest data shared by Atlas, VPN application downloads amounted to 5.58 million in the UAE with residents spending around $3.852 million (Dh14.14 million) to buy virtual private networks in 2020.

The data is extracted by Atlas VPN from Google Play Store and Apple App Store, using Sensor Tower service from the top 45 VPN services to get accurate download and revenue numbers.

The peak in VPN downloads was witnessed in March of 2020, just when the pandemic started to hit, at 637,190 downloads.

waheedabbas@khaleejtimes.com