Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Surfshark VS NextDNS

Compare Surfshark VS NextDNS and see what are their differences

Surfshark logo Surfshark

Surfshark is an award-winning, secure VPN that encrypts your online data to help you stay private & protected every day, hassle-free.

NextDNS logo NextDNS

Block ads, trackers and malicious websites on all your devices.
  • Surfshark Landing page
    Landing page //
    2024-05-06
  • NextDNS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-26

Surfshark features and specs

  • Affordability
    Surfshark offers competitive pricing and often provides discounts for longer subscription periods, making it a cost-effective VPN solution.
  • Unlimited Devices
    One of Surfshark's unique features is that it allows unlimited simultaneous connections on a single account, supporting families and multiple-device households without extra costs.
  • Strong Encryption and Security Features
    Surfshark employs AES-256-GCM encryption and offers features like CleanWeb (ad-blocking), MultiHop (double VPN), and a Kill Switch for strong online security.
  • No Logs Policy
    Surfshark operates under a strict no-logs policy, ensuring that they don’t track your online activities, which is crucial for privacy-conscious users.
  • Wide Server Network
    With over 3,200 servers in 65 countries, Surfshark provides excellent global coverage for unblocking geographically restricted content.
  • 24/7 Customer Support
    Surfshark offers around-the-clock customer service via live chat and email, providing assistance whenever needed.
  • Bypasser (Split Tunneling)
    This feature allows users to choose which apps or websites go through the VPN and which connect to the internet directly, offering greater flexibility.

NextDNS features and specs

  • Privacy Protection
    NextDNS prevents trackers, malicious websites, and ads from reaching your devices, ensuring better privacy and security online.
  • Customization
    NextDNS offers extensive customization options, allowing users to configure the DNS filtering rules to suit their specific needs, including custom blocklists and allowlists.
  • Performance Insights
    Provides detailed analytics and logs, helping users monitor DNS queries, block rates, and other performance metrics.
  • Multiple Devices
    Can be used across various devices and operating systems, including Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and more.
  • Parental Controls
    Includes parental control features to block adult content, social media, and gaming sites, making the internet safer for children.

Possible disadvantages of NextDNS

  • Cost
    While there is a free tier, accessing full features and unlimited queries requires a paid subscription, which might be a downside for budget-conscious users.
  • Learning Curve
    The extensive customizability may pose a learning curve for users who are not tech-savvy, requiring some technical understanding to optimize settings effectively.
  • Reliance on Cloud
    NextDNS operates through cloud-based servers, which means users must rely on their internet connection and NextDNS's server uptime for uninterrupted protection and performance.
  • Data Retention Concerns
    Even though privacy is a key feature, some users might still have concerns about data retention and the logging of DNS queries.
  • Potential for Overblocking
    Aggressive filtering can sometimes block legitimate websites or services, requiring users to manually adjust settings or whitelist certain domains.

Surfshark videos

Trust DNS - unblocks websites and even that

More videos:

  • Review - SurfShark VPN Review 2020 - IN-DEPTH & DETAILED SurfShark Review
  • Review - Surfshark VPN Review: What's the Catch? It's not what you think!
  • Review - 5 Reasons Not to Buy Surfshark VPN!
  • Review - Surfshark VPN Review 2024 - The Only Surfshark Review You'll Need! 🔥
  • Review - HONEST Surfshark review | Is it worth trying Surfshark VPN?
  • Review - Surfshark VPN Review 2024 - The Only Surfshark Review You'll Need! 🔥
  • Review - Surfshark VPN Review: Everything Revealed in 6 Minutes (PROS & CONS)

NextDNS videos

How To Set NextDNS on Your PC

More videos:

  • Review - NextDNS: A review and walkthrough
  • Review - NextDNS Review and Configuration
  • Review - NextDNS IS The Future of DNS!!

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Surfshark and NextDNS)
VPN
100 100%
0% 0
Security & Privacy
15 15%
85% 85
Ad Blockers
0 0%
100% 100
Cloud VPN
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Surfshark and NextDNS

Surfshark Reviews

The Best Top 10 VPNs for Spotify 2025
Surfshark’s Nexus technology allows users to specify entry and exit servers for MultiHop connections, providing additional security. With speeds fast enough for 4K video streaming, Surfshark is an excellent choice for Spotify users.
NordVPN vs Surfshark Comparison
NordVPN and Surfshark are both highly acclaimed VPNs, with the former having over ten years of experience and Surfshark over five. Interestingly, in 2022, NordVPN merged with Surfshark, but parent Nord Security keeps the businesses separate and intact.
Source: bestreviews.net
Best 5 Psiphon Alternatives in 2023
Last on the list is Surfshark, another name you’ve probably been hammered to death with. Surfshark’s biggest selling point is the support for an unlimited number of devices. Unlike basically all other VPNs, Surfshark allows you to connect as many devices to its service, on all of its plans! While the monthly subscription rates aren’t the cheapest, you do get some good bang...
Surfshark vs CyberGhost Comparison
There are a number of examples of funnily named VPN providers in the industry, and Surfshark is another entry on that list. Headquartered in the British Virgin Islands, it doesn’t just sound cool but it brings with it some pretty handy features, too, such as CleanWeb – a malware tracker and ad blocker – a kill switch, Wi-Fi protection, and more. But perhaps the most...
The Best NordVPN Alternatives in 2022
Aside from Surfshark’s awesome private DNS and leak protection features and AES-256-GCM encryption, it boasts of an ad-blocking feature and split tunneling capability to remove your selected apps or websites from the VPN connection.
Source: www.alphr.com

NextDNS Reviews

22 NextDNS Alternatives
NextDNS app intuitively encrypts all DNS queries on all networks and manages settings from your cell phones and tablets. NextDNS brings next-level protection from almost all kinds of security threats while blocking ads and trackers on applications as well as websites. This significant tool brings safe and supervised internet for kids on almost all networks and devices.
Free Privacy App for Any Device.
The other option is to host your own PiHole. NextDNS’s service is modelled on PiHole, and openly admit this in their FAQ. I personally host my own PiHole on a RaspberryPi 3b+ and have my traffic in my apartment routed through this. I trust NextDNS to protect me while I am on my mobile data, or in a coffee shop, but at home, I enjoy knowing that I have 100% control over my...
Source: medium.com

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, NextDNS seems to be a lot more popular than Surfshark. While we know about 509 links to NextDNS, we've tracked only 48 mentions of Surfshark. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Surfshark mentions (48)

  • World Rugby U20 Championship round 2 fixtures (Times=GMT+2)
    VPN will sort you out with the geo-blocking. I use SurfShark. Hasn't let me down yet. Cheap, fast, reliable and can be used on as many devices as you like. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Catch the Surfshark wave: with exciting new milestones and updates for June 🗞️
    Our homepage just got a facelift! It's part of our ongoing rebranding to make things easier for you. Drop by and see the new look at https://surfshark.com/! Source: almost 2 years ago
  • I’m in Canada and this is what Surfshark looks like in my apple profile when I look at my subscription. Is this odd?
    Mine looks the same way, and I also can no longer access surfshark.com. Source: about 2 years ago
  • I AM OUTRAGED
    I would recommend getting a VPN. I use Surfshark (which is good because it doesn't block torrenting, meaning, if you want to, you can pirate stuff to without the eyes of the PAP on you). Source: over 2 years ago
  • Unable to connect to Surfshark on Windows (JioFiber - India)
    VPNs which do not have servers in India are already being banned it seems. Cannot access surfshark.com without a VPN (ironic). Source: over 2 years ago
View more

NextDNS mentions (509)

  • uBlock Origin is no longer available on the Chrome Store
    uBlock Origin still works in Firefox. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ublock-origin/ And you can, I believe, still just modify your hosts table to block out ads in Chrome. https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts Or your router's DNS using something like NextDNS. https://nextdns.io/ Ads suck. Support content where you can, but even when you pay they still serve ads / tracking scripts. So fuck 'em. Block... - Source: Hacker News / about 2 months ago
  • Hack your DNS for better focus
    I've used NextDNS for years to keep our home internet safe for the kids and it works really well. Fortunately NextDNS offers API access that you can use to automate turning different internet filters on and off. Unfortunately their API docs are horrible. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Microsoft begins turning off uBlock Origin and other extensions in Edge
    I think that we'll need to adopt network-level filtering if we want to outsmart the browsers. I haven't looked back since adopting NextDNS and configuring my router to filter all traffic through it. It does a great job of stripping ads out of all my devices connected to it, and that's something I don't mind paying a few bucks for a year (I think it's like $19/year). Check it out here: https://nextdns.io/. - Source: Hacker News / 2 months ago
  • Pihole v6
    One of the most values I get out of a SaaS service is NextDNS [0]. There are competitors like ControlD [1] that are also very good. At the end of the day they both check all the boxes for me. But, the piece that really got me with NextDNS when I started using it was the unlimited number of profiles. This allows me to target any device, no matter where it is (this is fantastic for mobile devices) and keep my... - Source: Hacker News / 2 months ago
  • Pihole v6
    Want to highlight https://nextdns.io/ as a similar service, very happy with it. - Source: Hacker News / 2 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Surfshark and NextDNS, you can also consider the following products

NordVPN - NordVPN offers VPN technology that encrypts data twice.

Pi-hole - Pi-hole is a multi-platform, network-wide ad blocker.

ExpressVPN - ExpressVPN is the worlds fastest VPN service.

AdGuard - Surf the Web Ad-Free and Safely. Shield up!

ProtonVPN - ProtonVPN is a security focused FREE VPN service, developed by CERN and MIT scientists. Use the web anonymously, unblock websites & encrypt your connection.

Blokada - The best ad blocker for Android. Free and open source.