ExpressVPN user reviews: ratings by platform and the complaints that repeat

Trustpilot reviewers rate ExpressVPN above the average VPN there, while reviews in both app stores land below their platforms' all-VPN averages. One-star posts circle around two things: a tunnel that refuses to open and money taken at renewal. Five-star posts praise fast, stable connections and apps that work without fiddling.

Same app, three different verdicts

For scale: the TrustScore on the page is 4.4 from 27,904 reviews, the US App Store shows 4.68 from 419,478 ratings, Google Play 4.6 across 493K ratings and 100M+ installs. In the two app stores those badges outrun the written averages, because a star tap costs nothing while content users rarely type paragraphs; text reviews lean towards people with a problem and land lower than the badge. The smoothed figures stop a small sample from outranking a large one.

The Apple sample spans years and nine country storefronts. UK reviews average 4.58 and US ones 4.44, German ones 2.88, Italian 3.01, Emirati 2.67, so the blended figure partly reflects that regional spread alongside the app itself.

Why people give one star

In the two app stores, connection trouble leads. About six in ten negative App Store reviews mention connection, speed, servers or an app that is "not working" (713 of 1,187). On Google Play it is closer to one in four (221 of 853), partly because many angry Android posts run a few words and never name a cause. Three of the eight negative Trustpilot reviews raise the same theme. If a dead tunnel is your problem, a guide to fixing connection failures helps more than another hour of scrolling reviews.

Money comes second, and the complaints match the published terms. Basic costs $83.72 for the first 28 months, then renews at $99.95 a year, a monthly price that jumps 2.79 times. Auto-renewal is on by default for card and PayPal. The 30-day money-back guarantee covers new subscribers only, counted from the first purchase; renewals and redemption codes are excluded, and store purchases run through Apple or Google. That is why a surprise renewal rarely ends in a refund. Billing, renewal or refunds come up in about three in ten negative App Store reviews (348 of 1,187), about one in five on Google Play (166 of 853), and in three of eight on Trustpilot, including a double charge and a renewal nobody saw coming.

Older Apple reviews are packed with reports of mainland China trips where the app would not get online: 230 negative reviews mention it, though far fewer from 2025 and 2026. That fits the bypass sub-score of 1.9: obfuscation exists, but protocols such as VLESS Reality, Trojan, Shadowsocks or Hysteria2 are absent.

Trustpilot reads differently: reviewers there write mostly about the company. Four of the eight negative posts target support agents who answer from a script and never escalate, making support the most common negative topic on that platform. The company answered all eight.

What the five-star posts say

Speed and a connection that holds come first on every platform; they appear in 51 of 185 positive Trustpilot reviews and about one in five positive App Store reviews. Ease of use follows (37 of 185 on Trustpilot): install, tap a button, done. A noticeable group are long-time users who have paid for years and see no reason to switch.

Getting better or worse?

The monthly average across all three platforms peaked at 4.43 in October 2025, slid to a low of 3.65 in June 2026 and climbed back to 4.07 in October 2026, the busiest month with 618 reviews. The last 90 days on the App Store (4.32 from 299 reviews) run a full star kinder than the full archive (3.34), which points to the worst stretch being behind rather than ahead.

Reddit and forum threads

Across 46 threads, recurring titles are practical: whether renewing is worth the price, questions about reliability, a US streaming catalogue that stopped working, the fine print of the 2-year deal, China, the change of owner, and comparisons with NordVPN.

FAQ

Can I trust the Trustpilot rating?

As a picture of recent customers, yes: a raw average of 4.58 against 3.66 for all VPNs there. Its profile page also says the company has not invited customers to review recently, so the reviews arrive unprompted.

Does ExpressVPN reply to bad reviews?

Always on Trustpilot (8 of 8) and mostly on Google Play (598 of 853). In the App Store, none of the 1,187 negative reviews got a reply.

Do these reviews change the VPNRadarLab score?

No. The score of 4.77 out of 10, place 14 of 377, comes from published facts. The renewal jump is among the things that pull the value sub-score of 3.1 down.

What to take from the reviews

Trustpilot reviewers are largely satisfied, mobile reviewers less so, and their anger mostly concerns dead connections plus renewals they did not plan for. Check the auto-renew setting and the refund rules before paying, and skim the newest low reviews before trusting the store badge. If a renewal charge has already landed, see the page on getting a refund.