Hey guys. So I've been getting a lot of requests about doing a very basic guide to getting started
with using a VPN, how to connect to servers, just real simple steps. So that's what I'm going to do
today. And I'm going to start out with Express. It's my favorite VPN I like to use, I think it's
the best you can get in terms of just a best VPN, but also for newbies. It's very newbie friendly,
and I'll put a link to it down in the description. But I'll also show you with Nord and surf shark,
those are a couple other really great VPN. And I'll kind of explain some of the differences in
the end between those if you're trying to decide on a good VPN. But these principles will work for
pretty much any VPN. And that's why I'll show you what to express in Nord as well. So first,
let me just show you what the express how this works. Again, I'm showing you on a Mac. But
the same idea with with a PC, you'll just want to load, click on your, your application here and
Mac, have it here. Otherwise, you can go into your application folder and open it that way.
But I'm gonna go ahead and click on it, and it opens right there. Now just because I opened it,
it doesn't mean it's connected. See how it says not connected. That means my VPN is not yet
turned on. It's not yet offering any protection and so forth. So in order to do that, I'll just
want to click this button, you can see when I hover over it, it starts to even change color
a little bit. So let me just show you how that works. We're just going to click the button.
And you can see it's going to start connecting. Now it's connected. So now I'm protected by this
VPN. And it's as simple as that. Now, now I'm going to go into Okay, what exactly happened?
What did we connect to? And how do we make those changes, and then I'll get I'll show you with a
couple other VPN, just so you can see how how this works and how it's very similar across the board.
So let me go ahead and I'm going to disconnect here, just by pushing that button. So again,
now we see we're not connected. So when you open up something like Express Express is great,
because it has things, some features called like a smart location,
which means it's going to pick the best location for you. If you'd like, you have the option of
saying, basically you're telling ExpressVPN, you know what, I'm not sure I'm kind of new to VPNs.
Or I just want the convenience of you picking for me. So that's what this is for here. And not all
VPNs have this feature. Again, that's what's one of the things I love about Express and makes it
great for newbies, so you just click this button. And now it's connecting to the smart location,
which is Seattle. So I'm actually located in Oregon. And so it's choosing the best server
that that ExpressVPN can find that's nearest to me, that's going to give me the best speed,
and protection and so forth. So that's where it shows Seattle. So let me go ahead now I'm
basically I'm connected to the server in Seattle, which means when I'm browsing around online,
the online world is going to think I'm in Seattle, even though I'm actually physically in Oregon.
So I'm going to go ahead and disconnect from this again. Now, I'll give you I'll show you
one other step here. And then we'll go take a look at a couple other VPNs to show you how this
can can differ from VPN to VPN. So the we're using the smart location here. But let's say I want to
choose which is which is taking me to Seattle. But let's say I want to try connecting to something
in California. So I'm going to click Come over here. And I'm clicking on these three little,
little dots. And now I have all these regions here on the right. So I want to I can just search
for up here. And you know, type in type in a city. Like let's say I wanted to type in Los
Angeles. And you can see a Los Angeles options are showing up there. But let's say I'm not sure
which city I want in California, well then I can click this little down arrow here. And now we see
these different areas within the United States. And so I can see Oh, you know what, maybe there,
maybe San Francisco, let's try San Francisco. So I can click on San Francisco. And now that is been
my new selected location. So when I click the connect button, it's going to now connect me to
San Francisco. So now, when I am browsing around online, the online world thinks I am actually in
it thinks I'm physically in San Francisco, even though I'm actually in Oregon. So it's connecting
to the Express VPN in in San Francisco. So let me go ahead and disconnect again. And let me go ahead
and actually quit this. So I'm done using I'm done using the VPN, I'm just going to disconnect. And
I'm going to quit that altogether. And then we're just going to load it up again here.
And so you can see it's bringing up that most recent location I used, which was San Francisco,
but it also sees that a recent location I connected to us was Los Angeles. So you can
I can click on that. And now it'll Connect me to Los Angeles. So you can kind of think
of these as quick connect features just to make it a little more convenient for you.
But now, again, we can click on these three little dots. And here's where that smart
location icon went. So I can click back on that if I, if I want to use Express VPN choice for me
and say, Hey, express VPN, what do you recommend I should connect to? If I just want the fastest,
the best? The best experience? What do you recommend, that's what this smart location
is. And I can just click on that. Okay, now it's in your internet traffic, maybe unsecure during
reconnection. So this is good to know, let's say you're doing something online that you want,
you want to make sure it's protected, it's secure, no one's going to see what you're doing.
Then, if you're disconnecting and reconnecting, it wants to just be sure, hey, if you do this,
you know, your internet traffic may be unsecure. So while the VPN is disconnected, so it's a nice
little warning, just just in case. So I'm gonna say yes, that's fine, continue. And that way,
it gives you the option of oops, let me let me close down my browsers or you know,
whatever you're doing, to make sure you're safe there if you need to do something like that. So
that's basically the simplicity of connecting to a VPN. Now, one other thing I'll say about that,
sometimes people wonder, so does it matter? What server you connect to are some servers
like more more protective than others do you want to try to look like you're further away,
in terms of just the basic use of a VPN, really just connecting to the server that's closest to
you, is generally the best because it's going to give you the fastest speeds.
As far as from a safety encryption standpoint, that doesn't make a difference. So just just
know that now, if you want to look like you're in a specific region of the world, and that can be a
discussion for another time, that's when you have these options of connecting to all these servers
all over the world, to make it look like you're you're in another further further part of the
world, then say, for me, I'm just looking like I'm a state away. But really, even I could connect
to a server in another, another city near me. And that would still be fine from a from a protection
standpoint, because I'm using ExpressVPN to, I'm using sort of their cover their protection.
So again, that's how that works with ExpressVPN. And of course, if you have any other questions,
let me know down in the description below. Otherwise, I just want to pop open
Nord VPN here just to show you how this work. So Nord VPN, again, I'll put a link to Nord down in
the description as well, if you're interested in learning more about Nord, but they have
just like expressed their another premium VPN, you can use the Quick Connect feature here,
which basically is like Nord, take all the thinking for this, do all the thinking for me, and
go ahead and choose the best server, I want to leave that up to you. So you
can just click Quick Connect, and it's going to connect me, it looks like to a server
here in the Midwest. And so now I'm connected. So you can see up here, it's protected.
Now this is one thing. See already, if you notice the difference between Nord and express, to me,
it's a little more obvious here, I'll bring up Express, you can see the difference. It's a
little more obvious, the way Express, you know, they got the big button when you're connected.
It, it's a little more whoops, sorry, it's sorry, it was I was confusing it there. Once you connect.
Again, for a newbie, I think it's a little more obvious with Nord, it's not so obvious.
It's not that you're not protected. It just, you know, like said that you get this little green
at the little writing and get not a big deal. But if you're brand new, and you just like you know,
the interface of Express VPN a little bit, I find it's a little more. It's a little better
suited to newbies to people who are less tech savvy, and just want something very simple and
easy to understand. That certainly is one of the benefits of ExpressVPN. Now otherwise, with Nord,
you can just like with Express, you can go in and select a server from any of their regions
and areas around the world as well. So just like with the United States, we can go in here,
and you know, choose another region and so forth. So let me show you one other one and that is going
to be with surf shark. So let me go ahead and we're going to disconnect from Nord surf shark
is is like the best budget VPN It's great. It's a gives you It gives you the option of here you can
see you have fastest server and nearest country which you know, maybe that that might be helpful
for your situation, but generally, fastest server is the one you're going to want to
click if you just want to keep it easy. Take all the thinking out of it. Just like with Express,
you can use the smart location with Nord. It's the Quick Connect and was
surf shark, you can just use fastest server will be a great one. And so if I just press that,
it's going to go ahead and connect me to the fastest server, which is actually here in Oregon,
which is a benefit to me. So now I'm going to disconnect. And, again, it's already brought up,
when I click Connect, that's going to be my fastest server. Now, let me go ahead
and close down surf shark again and actually open it up, make sure it completely out of it,
bring it back in. Okay, so just again, to show you what this looks like,
when you just come into it, you can basically just click this button that will connect you.
And we can see it's connecting. And now we're connected. So again, pretty, I think
it's pretty good. I think surf shark is kind of in between Express and Nord, as far as from a from a
from a newbie standpoint, for beginners, I think expressed as the best at being very simple,
very uncluttered. Just give you the the basics here. And make it really obvious
when you're connected, not connected. Surf shark also does a very good job. But
I can see where the interface might be, you know, you kind of have to look around.
And it might be a little confusing, you know, which one do I if you're brand new. So again,
that's why I wanted to explain that. And then the last thing again, you can pick your your areas,
your regions down here, just like with the other VPN. What's kind of cool about surf shark is
they they kind of show you the server load with these little circles, and how full they are. So
if you have the option of choosing one that's less full, like this one's more full. So this one would
be lustful, that would be a better one, this one is empty. So that would be a better one as well.
That's something you can keep in mind. But again, this is just a very quick and basic guide to kind
of getting started and getting connected to a VPN. As you can see, these all have this similar
principle and idea. Now something to keep in mind, not all VPNs have a quick connect feature. That's
something I like about all three of these and why I like recommending them and why they're so great
for for newbies and beginners is it takes all the thinking out of it, you can just trust these VPN
to pick the best server for you. So how do you know which one to get if you're brand new to VPN,
and you're thinking of getting one, if you want the very best I'd go with Express, it gives you
the fastest speeds, it's easiest to use, it's the most reliable, it's been proven to not keep any of
your logs or activities. So Excellent, excellent VPN. And then if you want kind of the best value,
I think nords a great pick, it doesn't it's less expensive than ExpressVPN. Some of the trade off,
it's not quite as premium, you could save a VPN as as Express. So you're missing out on some of the
the features, and so forth, compared to ExpressVPN. But for someone who's looking for
just that, that sweet spot of excellent value, it's still getting all the the best protection
and so forth. nords a great choice. And then finally, I'd go with surf shark,
if you're, you know, looking for the best budget pick, let's say you're not doing maybe a lot of
streaming or torrenting or downloading, not that you you can use surf shark for that. But if that's
if you're doing a lot of that you might prefer the speeds of Nord and and and express so that
you're not waiting for your downloads or if you're trying to unblock Netflix libraries,
again, surf shark will do that. But sometimes the speeds can be a little more unpredictable
compared to Nord and express Express is going to be the most reliable in regards to this.
Nord is very good. But overall Express is going to be faster across all the different regions,
except for in European regions. Nord will be can outperform Express especially in like Italy,
New Zealand servers, Nord also does a little bit better, they're typically compared to express so
there are some kind of caveats to that were Nord will outdo Express and speed. But another neat
thing about surf shark is it gives you unlimited device connections. That means you can connect
to as many devices as you want. And it doesn't cost anything extra, which is amazing. So if you
have a, you know, larger family, larger household, that's a great way to go. Nord lets you connect to
six devices simultaneously. And Express allows you to connect to five devices simultaneously.
So if you need a lot of devices, you would in your with express or Nord, you'd either need to get
another subscription or just, you know, limit the amount of devices that are using it at one time,
or that's we're getting surf shark could be a great option. And maybe you're just
you're the trade off is you're not going to have as fast as speeds and so forth.
But again, I'll put links to all three of these down below,
along with any of the best deals or discounts I can get for you guys, including some free months
that aren't available on their website, when you typically go there to sign up. So feel
free to take advantage of that if you'd like. But otherwise, thank you so much
for your time really appreciate you guys watching. If you have any other questions,
let me know down below in the comments. Otherwise, stay safe and I will see you in the next video.