These days we do a lot of our shopping on the internet. Everything from music to software to plane tickets can be bought online. But what most people don’t know is that you can save a lot of money by shopping from different countries. But how is that even possible, you may wonder. Well, you can change your virtual location with a VPN to get sharp discounts. The same company may ask a different price for exactly the same product across different countries. The differences are bigger than you might think! In some countries in northern Europe you pay the highest prices for everything. Luckily, you can change your location with a VPN so you can start your shopping spree.
What is a VPN?
You may say to yourself: that sounds really nice, but what is a VPN exactly? Well, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) is software that encrypts all your online traffic and guides it through a secure internet connection. This way, no third party can see what you do online. You connect to an external VPN server and take on the IP address of that server. This makes it seem like you are located in the same country as the VPN server.
With a VPN you can choose to connect to a server that isn’t in the same county as you are. Websites will think you are in that country instead of your own. They will show you prices in their web shop that they show in that country. This way you can save a lot of money.
Two Good VPN Providers to Start Saving Money
If you want to start saving money online, we would advise the use of one of the following VPN providers. The ideal VPN to save money online needs to adhere to a couple of things. First of all, it is very important that the VPN has servers in a lot of different countries, especially countries where things are generally cheaper. Secondly, the VPN needs to have good security so that websites won’t be able to find out where you actually are. Finally, you want a VPN with good speeds, so you won’t have to wait forever for websites to load. The following VPN providers are selected with these needs in mind. Also check out our list of the best over-all VPN providers.
ExpressVPN to Save Money
ExpressVPN is a suitable provider to save money online. This premium VPN has more than 1500 servers in 94 different countries. This will provide you with more than enough choice so you can shop in nearly every country. ExpressVPN adheres to the highest international security measures and achieves high speeds. This provider is perfect for saving money online.
If you want to try out ExpressVPN, you can do so with their 30-days money-back guarantee. This will allow you to check out their service before fully committing to a subscription.
- Very easy to use VPN
- Perfect for anonymous browsing, downloading, and streaming (i.e. Netflix)
- 3000+ servers in 94 countries
NordVPN to Save Money
NordVPN is also a perfect choice for saving money online. This provider is known for their great security measures. NordVPN has an amazing server network with over 3700 servers in 62 countries. With this large number of servers, you will be able to find the best discounts while shopping your way around the globe.
The price for a NordVPN subscription is relatively cheap. It is one of the best VPN’s in terms of value for money. NordVPN also offers the option of trying out their service for a month before you commit.
- Excellent protection and a large network of servers
- Nice and pleasing application
- No logs
5 Online Money Saving Tips
Although you can find a cheap option for almost everything online, not all discounts are worth the trouble. For less expensive products the money you save will probably go to shipping. However, for some products the difference is so big that the cost of the VPN and shipping are definitely worth it. Below you can find 5 major ways of saving money online with a VPN. We tested the discounts from the Netherlands but the differences can be very similar in other countries. We advise you research the product you want to buy, by connecting to servers in several different countries to see where you can get the biggest discount.
Save Money on Hardware
For most physical things we buy online the discounts won’t be big enough to bother. However, when it comes down to hardware the differences in price are so big, it would be a smart choice to look at your options. Large companies like Apple and Windows will have different prices for their products depending on your location. These differences in price can sometimes come down to several hundreds of euros or dollars. We tested the difference is price between several countries, using a VPN.
In the Netherlands Apple charges €1160,45 ($1412,39) for an iPhone X, while you pay $999 for the same iPhone in the U.S. This means that the iPhone is $413,39 cheaper in the U.S. This crazy difference in price means it’s worth shopping through an American server for many Europeans.
Like phones, a lot of hardware might be cheaper somewhere else. We also tested the Windows Surface Book 2, which is a relatively expensive laptop made by Windows. In the Netherlands you can find this laptop for €1749 ($2129,04) while it is offered in the U.S. for only $1349,-. This means that it is one third of the price cheaper in the U.S. Again, it would almost be silly not to make use of these beautiful discounts.
When you are buying hardware from a different country there are some things you should keep in mind. One of those things is that you have to pay for shipping. When the company you are buying from doesn’t ship to your country, you can check out one of the following companies; MyUS.com, and Bundlebox.These companies will gladly help you with the shipping for a little fee. Moreover, you might also have to pay import taxes. However, with products like the ones mentioned above it will still be more than worth it.
Save Money on Software
It is incredibly easy to save money on software you buy online. Software companies will charge very different prices across different countries. This is true for one-time purchases as well as for monthly subscriptions. Some examples are companies like, Microsoft, Adobe, and IBM. We tested these companies by accessing their webshops from servers in different countries, using a VPN. Below you will find our results for Adobe and IBM software. The products were clearly cheaper in the U.S. than they were in European countries.
The first example is the “Acrobat Pro DC” by Adobe. Below you can see the price in the Netherlands on the left and the price in the U.S. on the right.
The price in euros comes down to slightly over 22 dollars, which means the difference is over 7 dollars. This is a substantial difference, especially if you save this amount every month. This would mean you save 84 dollars every year!
We also looked at the differences in price of some IBM software. The differences in price were less impressive, but again they add up if you save a little every month. You can see that the ‘MaaS360 with Watson’ software is more expensive in the Netherlands than it is in the U.S.
When you calculate the euros to dollars this software costs $ 4,70 a month in the Netherlands. This means you can get a great discount if you are in the Netherlands but connect to a U.S. server. Since this type of software is used in companies, that sometimes buy these subscriptions for hundreds of people at the same time, the discount can be quite substantial.
Save Money on Streaming Services
With a VPN you can also save money on subscriptions with streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Google play, and iTunes. As an example we looked at the cost of a Netflix subscription in the U.S. and Mexico. Since you can use both subscriptions in the U.S., it is quite strange that there is such a large difference. You can save money on subscriptions with a VPN very easily.
The price in U.S. dollars is the price you pay in the U.S. the other prices are in Mexican pesos. The Mexican prices come down to $5,78 for the basic subscription, $7,90 for the standard subscription , and $10,55 for the premium subscription. The difference between two countries can help American Netflix users save a couple of dollars every month. That translates into 3 months of free Netflix, every year!
Save Money on Dating Apps
Dating apps or websites offer subscriptions for different prices in every country. This means you can get an account with an international dating app like Parship, Match.com, My Single Friend, and eHarmony, for way less money than usual.
If you would like to use one of these apps for a lower fee, you might want to shop around the world with a VPN.
As an example we tried to find a country where a subscription to Parship is cheaper than in the Netherlands. The minimum price for an account with Parship is €24,90 a month. In Mexico you can get a Parship account for only €8,93, which means there is a difference of almost 16 euros. This seems incredible, since you can use the Mexican account in the Netherlands without a problem. Consequently, you can use these 16 euros to take your date to the movies!
Save Money by Reusing Trials
Some services online have free trials or put restrictions on the amount of times you can use their service for free. After these trials they want to get you to commit to a subscription. By changing your IP address with a VPN you can make use of most trials for as long as you want.
The MOZ “Open Site Explorer” tool is a good example of a website that can be tricked with a VPN. It is an internet tool that can show you how your websites scores. You can use this twice a day but after that you get the following notice:
Like many other online services, MOZ asks you to get a subscription if you want to use their service more often. The free trials are used to let people get acquainted with their service. Ideally, you buy a subscription after trying it out. For the example of MOZ this would mean you would pay $159,- a month after the trial. Luckily, you can use a VPN to continue using the free trial version.
These type of websites look at your IP address to see if you have used their service before. Your IP address is the fingerprint of your internet connection. Once you connect to the VPN server you take on a different IP address. With most VPN providers this IP address changes a lot. Consequently, it will seem like you are a new user, every time you access the web tool.
Final Thoughts
With a VPN you can change your virtual location and make websites think you are accessing them from a different country. A lot of companies sell their products for drastically different prices in different countries. This means you can save a lot of money by changing your online location. Among the things you can save money on are hardware, software, subscriptions to dating sites, and subscriptions to streaming services. You can also reuse trials for an infinite amount of time, by changing your IP address with a VPN. In some cases, you can even get cheaper flights by using a VPN. All in all, being smart with a VPN can save you a lot of money.
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https://vpnoverview.com/unblocking/save-money/discounts-online-shopping/
