Are you tired of your internet being slow? We’re all like that, aren’t we? Whether you’re stuck in a hotel with shaky connections and slow speeds, your local cafe has amazing coffee but terrible Wi-Fi, or your home network bogs down every night (or all of the time), lousy internet is often a way of life. The issue is, there are multiple ways to go online in most countries.
Perhaps there’s an Ethernet cable tucked away in the corner. Your laptop could be able to detect a dozen other Wi-Fi networks. It’s possible that your phone plan includes more data than you’ll ever use. Wouldn’t it be great if you could merge all of them into a single, quicker, more dependable connection?
That’s the promise of Connectify’s Speedify, a software that lets you connect to multiple networks at the same time to speed up your connection in a smart, secure way. After sponsoring the company’s Kickstarter campaign in 2012, I first utilised its products, and the recent release of Speedify 10 reminded me that it had been much too long since I’d done so. It was past time to put things right.
Faster, More Reliable Internet
Speedify combines two or more different ways of connecting to the internet into one smooth connection using a technology known as channel bonding. What’s the end result? More reliable service and faster speeds. To say the least, the app is comprehensive in terms of the kind of connections it may leverage.
It can employ physical network cables, a USB 3G/4G adapter that plugs into your computer, or your phone’s data in a variety of ways in addition to merging several Wi-Fi networks. While you can easily mix multiple types of connections without additional hardware, joining two Wi-Fi networks at the same time will almost certainly require a second wireless card.
Fortunately, they’re inexpensive and easy to come by, and if you acquire the appropriate one, you’ll also receive a better signal. All of this should, of course, result in higher internet speeds. Speedify keeps track of all of your available connections and prioritises the quickest, most dependable one by default (s).
Even if one goes down completely, the service will immediately switch to the other(s), even if you’re in the middle of a download or video conversation. However, you can change that behaviour, which is handy if one of your connections has a limited amount of data. You can set traffic limitations per day or month if your phone plan only has a few gigabytes available.
Once you’ve reached that limit, you can opt to reduce the speed or turn off the connection entirely. Similarly, you may choose whether to handle all available connections equally or to designate one or more as “secondary” or “backup” services to minimise the frequency with which they are used.
Enhanced Streaming
With so many individuals working from home and being caught on lengthy Zoom calls recently, the poor quality of many home internet connections has become apparent.
Connectify realised this and decided to abandon its original development objectives earlier this year in favour of boosting streaming connections.
The software now automatically recognises a variety of streaming traffic, including Zoom or Google Meet, Skype or WhatsApp person-to-person chats, and even live-streaming via Twitch or Instagram Live.
On your computer or device, Speedify prioritises this type of traffic above all others, making use of all available connections to provide dependable service. It will send the same data across various networks to ensure that it gets through on shaky connections, and if one fails, another will smoothly take over.
VPN Security
Speedify was already a VPN by default because most of its smarts are in the cloud and your data is secured in transit. The company built on that to offer servers in more than 35 countries, and while the app will suggest the fastest choice for you, you may choose from the US and UK to India, Australia, Israel, and even Libya if you like.
If you don’t already have a VPN, Speedify is a cost-effective option to get one, especially because it’s comparable to or less expensive than other dedicated providers. Even when you’re not using many connections at once, it’s one of the fastest VPNs available. One of Speedify’s newest features, useful for travellers, is adequate support for “captive portals,” those unpleasant Wi-Fi sign-in boxes you often see with hotels, cafes, and public networks.
These portals aren’t normally compatible with VPN services, but the software recognises them and displays them without disconnecting the connection. However, Speedify does not support VPN-blocking streaming services like Netflix, BBC iPlayer, or Amazon Prime, and logs a little more data about your sessions than we prefer (although not the sites you visit or content you view).
If I were only searching for a VPN, I’d probably stick with ExpressVPN or one of our other travel VPN choices. Speedify, on the other hand, is difficult to top as a good VPN that comes with all of the app’s other features.
So How Well Does Speedify Work?
So far, everything appears to be in order on paper, but how well does it perform in practise? Speedify is a cross-platform application that works on macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, and iOS. I tested the software on a Windows 10 laptop and an Android 10 phone, and it installed in a matter of seconds on both.
Speedify immediately detected both the Wi-Fi and mobile networks on the phone, making Wi-Fi the primary connection and the cell network the secondary. I started testing after setting a daily data restriction on the cell connection.
I connected to the Wi-Fi and started an HD YouTube video after running a couple of speed tests to verify sure everything was working properly. I shut off the Wi-Fi completely after thirty seconds, and it didn’t lose a beat. Speedify moved to the secondary connection on its own, the video resumed to stream, and everything went back to normal.
I restarted the Wi-Fi after half a minute, and Speedify was up and running in a matter of seconds. The tests were then performed on a video conversation, and there were no dropouts or stuttering this time: the call merely kept going while the programme switched between Wi-Fi and cell connections. Impressive.
Returning to the laptop, I ran multiple Speedify tests with a variety of networks, both individually and in combination. The programme recognised every possible combination of network cable, Wi-Fi via the laptop’s built-in card or a USB adapter, and tethering to my phone via Bluetooth or a USB connection.
At one time, I had four active connections: cable, two Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth tethering, all of which were shared by Speedify. For each network, detailed statistics were provided, as well as a dashboard with current speeds and a star rating that displayed connection quality at a glance. Pulling cables or disconnecting connections caused Speedify to automatically switch to the other networks, while my YouTube video continued to play.
How Fast Is Speedify?
The speed of Speedify is difficult to assess because it is entirely dependent on the number of connections you are using. With Speedify activated, my house Wi-Fi download speed fell by around a third, while upload speed remained unchanged. Of fact, if you use many connections, you may wind up with substantially quicker total speeds. My aggregate download speed nearly doubled when I linked to a second Wi-Fi network. Again, upload speeds remained consistent. The speed increased when more networks were added.
When I had four connections and was doing speed tests to saturate the network, download speeds reached over 110Mbps at times, as shown in the screenshot above. Even though the speed test results are great, they don’t reveal the whole storey. Even if standard speed tests don’t offer you much optimism, you’ll get a better streaming experience on crowded networks thanks to the inherent quality of service (QoS) prioritisation for video and voice calls.
Verdict
In a nutshell, Speedify is one of those unusual products that performs exactly what it claims and does it effectively. If you’re looking for a means to speed up your internet, whether you’re at home, in a café, or stuck in a dirty hotel somewhere, this software might be able to assist.
Of course, it’s not magic, and there’s not much Speedify (or anything else) can do if you don’t have any other connections except that one lousy Wi-Fi network. That, however, is unusual in my experience, especially as public Wi-Fi, high-speed cell networks, substantial data allocations, and reasonable international roaming become increasingly widespread.
If you have more than one way to access online, Speedify can make a significant difference. Thanks to the app’s intelligent prioritisation, this is especially true if you’re having trouble with low-quality Zoom calls or other video and audio streaming. It’s just the frosting on the cake to have a competent, though basic, VPN built in.
How do you improve the speed of your internet, make it more reliable, and stay safe on shady public networks? It’s not difficult to sell, especially at the current price. While Speedify’s usual monthly fee is a somewhat hefty $9.99, the price drops dramatically when you join up for a longer period of time.
A three-year individual plan costs roughly $2.99 per month, while a family package costs around $4.50 per month. If you want to try it out first, Speedify gives you 2GB of bandwidth every month for free. There’s no need to enter credit card information or personal information because it works without requiring you to create an account.
