⚡ Quick Verdict:
- Pricing: Aura plans run from $10/month to $32/month. Tailscale’s Personal plan is free, and Personal Plus is $5/per month.
- Best for: Aura suits families who want identity theft protection plus a simple VPN. Tailscale suits developers who need remote access to their own devices.
- Key difference: Aura hides your IP address by default. Tailscale links your devices directly and only hides your IP through an exit node.
- Our pick: Aura for most beginners. It guards your identity, money, and browsing from one app.
AuraVPN and Tailscale both call themselves a VPN.
But they solve completely different problems.
Aura is an identity theft protection service with a VPN tucked inside.
Tailscale is a secure networking tool for connecting your own devices.
Pick the wrong one, and you’ll pay for features you never use.
Overview
We reviewed documentation, pricing pages, and user reviews for both tools.
Our writers also spent hands-on time with each one.
Those observations appear in the “What Our Team Noticed” sections below.
By the end, you’ll know which one fits your needs between AuraVPN vs Tailscale.
What is AuraVPN?
AuraVPN is the VPN built into Aura’s all-in-one digital safety app.
You can’t buy it alone.
It comes bundled with antivirus software, a password manager, and identity monitoring.
Aura recommends the VPN for public Wi-Fi at airports and cafes.
It also blocks malicious sites and other dangerous sites before they load.
The real draw is Aura’s identity theft protections, not the VPN itself.
It watches the dark web, your credit, and your bank accounts for fraud.
Here’s a quick video look at how the whole Aura package works.
AuraVPN
One app for your identity, your money, and your browsing. Every adult on a plan gets identity theft insurance.
AuraVPN Pricing
Aura plans are priced by how many people you want to cover.
| Plan | Price | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Family | $32/month | Households with kids and up to five adults |
| Couple | $22/month | Two adults sharing one account |
| Individual | $12/month | One adult who wants full coverage |
| Kids | $10/month | Parents who only need child safety tools |
Pricing verified September 2026.
Free trial: Yes. Every plan has a 14-day free trial, and you can cancel without charge.
Money-back guarantee: Aura offers a 60-day money back guarantee on all its plans.
📌 Note: Aura plans share the same core features. You pay for more people, not more tools. The VPN isn’t a paid add on. The Family plan covers up to five adults and unlimited kids’ Social Security Numbers.
⚠️ Price check: Some review sites list higher month-to-month rates. They show $15 Individual, $29 Couple, and $50 Family. Lower rates often reflect annual billing. Confirm the final price at checkout.
Key Benefits of AuraVPN
Here’s what makes Aura worth considering:
- Identity theft insurance: Each adult gets up to $1 million for eligible losses and fees. That includes legal fees after a theft.
- Fast fraud alerts: Aura checks your details against billions of data points. It claims credit fraud alerts arrive up to 250 times faster than rivals.
- Money monitoring: It tracks bank accounts and suspicious financial transactions. Investment account monitoring is included too.
- One-tap credit lock: You can lock your Experian credit file instantly. That blocks new accounts in your name.
- Real fraud specialists: U.S.-based agents help you recover if identity thieves strike.
- Up to 10 devices each: Individual plans cover 10 devices. Family plans stretch to 50 devices across five adults.
What Our Team Noticed
Our writer signed up for Aura and explored the dashboard, VPN, and alert settings. Here’s what stood out:
AuraVPN Pros & Cons
✅ Pros
- Identity theft insurance up to $1 million per adult
- VPN, antivirus, and password manager in every plan
- 60-day money-back guarantee plus a 14-day free trial
- Parental controls with safe gaming and screen time limits
❌ Cons
- VPN has no kill switch and no manual server choice
- Antivirus lacks a firewall and scheduled scans
- Pricier than standalone VPN services
What is Tailscale?
Tailscale is a zero-trust mesh VPN for your own devices.
It links them into a private network called a “tailnet.”
Every connection runs on the WireGuard protocol with end-to-end encryption.
Your traffic doesn’t pass through Tailscale’s servers.
Instead, each device talks straight to the others.
Developers and IT teams use it to reach computers, servers, and files remotely.
This tutorial shows how to install Tailscale and connect your first device.
Tailscale
Reach every device you own from anywhere. The free plan covers 3 users and 100 devices.
Tailscale Pricing
Tailscale keeps personal pricing simple. Here’s what it costs.
| Plan | Price | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | $0 Free Forever | Individual users and home labs |
| Personal Plus | $5/per month | Households that need more users |
Pricing verified September 2026.
Free trial: The Personal plan is free forever. Sign up with a custom domain, and you get a 14-day Enterprise trial.
Money-back guarantee: Not needed on the free plan. Check Tailscale’s terms before you buy a paid plan.
📌 Note: The free plan allows 3 users and up to 100 devices. Free users get email support during business hours. They can also file bugs on GitHub.
⚠️ Price check: Running a company? Tailscale also sells team plans. Some sources list Starter at $6 per user monthly and Premium at $18 per user. Confirm current rates on its pricing page.
Key Benefits of Tailscale
Here’s what makes Tailscale worth a look:
- Direct mesh links: Devices connect to each other, not a central hub. That means less lag than old hub-and-spoke VPNs.
- No router setup: UDP hole punching and NAT traversal get through firewalls for you. No dedicated hardware is required.
- Stable addresses: Each device gets a unique 100.x.y.z IP address. MagicDNS, enabled by default, lets you use names instead.
- Identity-based rules: Access control lists work by user and group, not IP. Custom roles tighten network security further.
- Grow at your pace: Incremental deployment lets you add devices one at a time. Nothing already installed has to change.
- Wide platform support: The Tailscale client runs on every major operating system. That includes Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, iOS, and even Apple TV.
What Our Team Noticed
Our writer set up a tailnet and connected a few personal devices to it. Here’s what stood out:
Tailscale Pros & Cons
✅ Pros
- Free plan covers 3 users and 100 devices
- Direct WireGuard connections with no central bottleneck
- Access rules based on identity, not IP addresses
- Quick setup: install the client, sign in, and connect
❌ Cons
- Doesn’t hide your IP unless you run an exit node
- Free support is email-only during business hours
- ACLs and subnet routers take time for beginners to learn
Feature Comparison
These two tools barely overlap. So we compared them on what each one actually does.
Below are nine key features, plus a side-by-side look at pricing.
| Feature | AuraVPN | Tailscale |
|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | $10/month | Free |
| Free Plan | ❌ | ✅ |
| Hides Your IP Address | ✅ | Only with an exit node |
| Identity Theft Protection | ✅ | ❌ |
| Remote Access to Own Devices | ❌ | ✅ |
| Antivirus | ✅ | ❌ |
| Password Manager | ✅ | ❌ |
| Access Control Lists | ❌ | ✅ |
| Parental Controls | ✅ | ❌ |
| Best For | Families and beginners | Developers and IT teams |
1. VPN & Online Privacy
AuraVPN: Aura’s VPN encrypts your internet connection and hides your IP address. Aura lists over 100 virtual locations. Yet according to reviews, you can’t pick a server yourself. Speed loss is minimal, and Aura says it keeps no browsing history. It may log your IP briefly during a session.
There’s no kill switch either. P2P traffic is allowed, but torrenting isn’t recommended without one. Aura calls it a decent all-rounder, not a streaming tool. Split tunneling lets you choose which apps skip the VPN. The app runs on Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows platforms. With Aura installed on your phone, the VPN is one tap away.
Tailscale: Tailscale is a different kind of virtual private network. It connects your own devices, not a pool of public servers.
To hide your IP, you set up an exit node on a device you control. Then all internet traffic flows through that machine.
⚠️ Warning: Aura’s VPN doesn’t officially support China or parts of the Middle East. It lacks the obfuscation needed for restricted networks.
2. Identity & Access Security
AuraVPN: Aura’s identity theft protection scans the dark web, data breaches, and data broker sites. It hunts for leaks of your personal information and online accounts. It also offers home title monitoring and address monitoring for added protection.
Keep in mind, the protection is reactive. It alerts you after identity theft is detected, not before.
Tailscale: Tailscale runs on a zero-trust model. Every connection is checked against who you are, not where you are.
Its client code is open source, so anyone can inspect it. Admins set access control lists from a web dashboard. They can group users and decide which devices each group can reach.
3. Remote Access
AuraVPN: Aura doesn’t offer remote access. It can’t link you to a home computer or office files.
Tailscale: This is where Tailscale works best. You can reach your MacBook Pro, a Linux server, or other devices from any network.
Creating a tailnet is simple. The process for new users: download the Tailscale app, sign in, and connect. You can invite others by sending a link to the login page.
4. Credit Monitoring & Financial Fraud
AuraVPN: Aura’s credit monitoring watches your credit reports for new accounts and credit inquiries. Most credit inquiries come from lenders you chose. Aura flags the ones you didn’t. Then you can lock your Experian file right away.
Don’t expect the same score your bank sees, though. Lenders rely on different credit scoring systems.
Tailscale: Tailscale has no financial features. It protects network traffic, not financial accounts or credit files.
💡 Pro Tip: You can still pull your free annual credit report on your own. Aura just automates the watching.
5. Identity Theft Insurance
AuraVPN: Every Aura plan includes up to $1 million in identity theft insurance per adult member. It covers eligible losses and legal fees.
Aura helps with recovery too, through U.S. fraud specialists. That hands-on help matters more than the number.
Tailscale: Tailscale offers no insurance. That makes sense for a networking tool, not a consumer safety app.
6. Antivirus & Malware Protection
AuraVPN: Aura antivirus gives real time malware protection against viruses, spyware, and ransomware. Reviews cite lab scores between 98% and 100%, so it stops most malware. It also blocks malicious websites and phishing pages.
But other features are thin. There’s no firewall, Wi-Fi network protection, or system cleanup. You can’t schedule scans or view scan logs. Norton and Bitdefender pack in more tools.
Tailscale: Tailscale has no antivirus. It does cut exposure, since your private services stay off the open internet.
⚠️ Warning: Aura’s antivirus runs on three operating systems: Windows, Mac, and Android. It doesn’t cover iOS devices.
7. Data Broker & Spam Removal
AuraVPN: Aura sends removal requests to data brokers that sell your details. It also handles spam list removal to cut junk calls and texts.
It’s one of Aura’s unique features. Most VPN services don’t include anything like this.
Tailscale: Tailscale doesn’t touch your data online. Its privacy focus is keeping private traffic off the public internet.
8. Network & Cloud Infrastructure
AuraVPN: Aura isn’t built for company networks, servers, or cloud resources.
Tailscale: Tailscale connects offices, clouds, and data centers without complex routing. A subnet router reaches office printers and other clients that can’t run Tailscale.
Its decentralized design eliminates single points of failure. If one path fails, traffic reroutes.
It stretches into bigger setups too. Coordination servers handle key exchange, while data flows device to device. That works across Google Cloud, AWS, and Kubernetes clusters.
9. Password Manager & Family Tools
AuraVPN: Aura’s password manager creates strong passwords and fills them across apps. It warns you when a password shows up in a breach. It ties into identity alerts. Anything Aura monitored for you appears in the same app.
The Family plan adds parental controls. Parents can filter harmful sites, manage apps, and watch for cyberbullying. A digital vault also locks away sensitive information and files.
Tailscale: Tailscale has no password manager or family tools. Sign-in runs through single sign-on with your Google, Microsoft, or GitHub account. Tailscale says it works with over 100 identity and tech providers.
10. Pricing & Cost
Let’s compare the pricing plans side by side.
| Plan | AuraVPN | Tailscale |
|---|---|---|
| Free | ❌ | Personal: $0 Free Forever |
| Entry | Kids: $10/month | Personal Plus: $5/per month |
| Individual | $12/month | — |
| Couple | $22/month | — |
| Family | $32/month | — |
AuraVPN: You pay for identity protection and get the VPN included. Aura’s pricing is premium next to identity protection services with fewer features. Still, you replace three or four separate apps.
Tailscale: Most individual users never pay a cent. The free tier handles 3 users and 100 devices. Personal Plus adds room for a bigger household.
Different Scenarios
| If You Need… | Choose | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Tight budget | Tailscale | Free plan covers most people |
| Identity theft protection | AuraVPN | Insurance, credit lock, fraud help |
| Remote access to your devices | Tailscale | Direct mesh between devices |
| Privacy on public Wi-Fi | AuraVPN | Hides your IP by default |
| Protecting kids online | AuraVPN | Parental controls and safe gaming |
| Team or cloud networking | Tailscale | ACLs, subnet routers, SSO |
💰 Your Budget
Tailscale costs nothing for most home setups. Aura costs more, but it bundles identity, antivirus, and VPN tools you’d otherwise buy separately. Bundling can save money.
🔌 Your Tech Stack
Tailscale fits people running servers, home labs, or cloud apps. Aura fits everyday phones and laptops with zero configuration.
🛡️ What You’re Protecting
Protecting your identity and money? Choose Aura. Protecting access to your own machines? Choose Tailscale.
🎓 Your Experience Level
The vast majority of beginners will find Aura easier on day one. Tailscale is simple to connect, but exit nodes and ACLs take time to configure.
🆓 Free Trials and Demos
Aura gives a 14-day free trial, so you can test Aura risk-free. Tailscale’s Personal plan is free forever, so you can try it with no deadline.
🛟 Support Options
Aura connects you with U.S. fraud specialists when things go wrong. Tailscale’s free support is email-only and limited to business hours.
Switching Guide
Already using one of these tools? Here’s what to expect if you switch.
🔄 Switching from AuraVPN to Tailscale?
✅ What you’ll gain:
- Remote access to your own computers and servers
- A free plan for up to 100 devices
- Direct connections that skip central servers
❌ What you’ll lose:
- Identity theft insurance and fraud specialists
- Credit monitoring and your Experian lock
- Antivirus, password manager, and parental controls
📋 How to switch:
- Export your saved passwords from Aura’s password manager
- Create a Tailscale account and install the client on each device
- Set an exit node if you still want to hide your IP
🔄 Switching from Tailscale to AuraVPN?
✅ What you’ll gain:
- Identity and credit monitoring with instant alerts
- A VPN that hides your IP with no extra setup
- Antivirus with real time protection and family safety tools
❌ What you’ll lose:
- Remote access between your own devices
- Subnet routers, MagicDNS, and exit nodes
- Identity-based access control lists
📋 How to switch:
- Keep Tailscale running if you still need remote access
- Start Aura’s 14-day free trial and choose a plan
- Add your personal information so Aura can start monitoring
What Our Review Didn’t Cover
This comparison focused on individuals, families, and small home setups. We didn’t test Tailscale’s paid business tiers or large enterprise networks. We also didn’t file an insurance claim. Nor did we compare Aura with Identity Guard, its sister brand. Features and prices reflect September 2026 and may change.
Final Verdict
| Category | Winner |
|---|---|
| 💰 Pricing | Tailscale |
| 🛡️ Identity Protection | AuraVPN |
| 🌐 Privacy on Public Wi-Fi | AuraVPN |
| 🖥️ Remote Access | Tailscale |
| 🦠 Malware Protection | AuraVPN |
| 👶 Ease of Use | AuraVPN |
| 👨👩👧 Family Features | AuraVPN |
| 🔌 Network Infrastructure | Tailscale |
| 🏆 Overall Winner | AuraVPN |
🏆 WINNER: AURAVPN
AuraVPN wins 5 out of 8 categories.
Best for: Families, beginners, and anyone worried about identity theft
AuraVPN and Tailscale are two very different products. Aura is a safety bundle for everyday people. Tailscale is basically a private network for people who manage devices.
Tailscale is excellent for remote access and team networks. It’s free for most home users, and the mesh design is fast.
But most people searching for a VPN want privacy and protection. Aura covers safe browsing and identity protection, plus insurance if something goes wrong. That’s why Aura takes the win for this audience.
More of AuraVPN Compared
Here’s how Aura stacks up against VPN services and other identity theft protection services:
AuraVPN vs NordVPN
AuraVPN wins on: identity theft insurance, credit monitoring with an Experian lock, and parental controls for the whole family
NordVPN wins on: a kill switch, manual server selection, and a cheaper price if you only want a VPN
AuraVPN vs Surfshark
AuraVPN wins on: U.S. fraud specialists, home title monitoring, and bank account alerts
Surfshark wins on: unlimited device connections, obfuscation for restricted countries, and picking your own server
AuraVPN wins on: a password manager tied to breach alerts, identity insurance, and a single family dashboard
ProtonVPN wins on: a free VPN plan, open-source apps, and Secure Core routing for stronger privacy
More of Tailscale Compared
Here’s how Tailscale compares with other tools people consider:
Tailscale vs ExpressVPN
Tailscale wins on: a free plan, direct access to your own devices, and identity-based access rules
ExpressVPN wins on: servers across many countries, streaming unblocking, and a built-in kill switch
Tailscale wins on: subnet routers, MagicDNS device names, and support for servers and Kubernetes
ProtonVPN wins on: hiding your IP by default, Secure Core routing, and no need to run your own exit node
Tailscale vs Private Internet Access
Tailscale wins on: no central server bottleneck, incremental deployment, and SSO sign-in
Private Internet Access wins on: a large public server network, port forwarding, and location switching for streaming
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Aura VPN do?
It encrypts your connection and hides your IP address on public Wi-Fi. It also blocks known scam and phishing sites. The VPN comes bundled with identity theft protection.
Is paying for Aura worth it?
Yes, if you want identity monitoring, insurance, antivirus, and a VPN together. If you only need a VPN, a standalone service costs less.
What is the difference between Tailscale and normal VPN?
A normal VPN routes traffic through the provider’s servers. Tailscale connects your own devices directly using WireGuard, so traffic skips central servers.
Is Tailscale free for personal use?
Yes. The Personal plan is free forever for up to 3 users and 100 devices. Personal Plus costs $5 per month.
Does Tailscale hide your IP address?
Not by default. It only hides your IP when you route traffic through an exit node. Websites then see that device’s IP address instead.
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