Who says the higher the quality, the better, as some VPN services charge users hefty fees, but this provider has managed to keep its prices down while maintaining world-class quality.

The provider in question is Hotspot Shield, whose latest VPN deal rivals some of the cheapest VPNs on the market right now. For only $2.49 per month, you can get three years of access to a top-rated VPN.

In our tests, it has proven to be excellent at anonymity, unblocking regionally restricted content, and offers incredibly fast connections thanks to its proprietary Catapult Hydra technology.

However, if you visit the Hotspot Shield site, you will notice that this deal is not available. That's because this is the best price available exclusively to readers of Tom's Guide and our sister site TechRadar. Details are below.

Hotspot Shield is all about connection speed, and it is very impressive. In our tests, we've seen speeds up to over 400 Mbps, well beyond what most domestic broadband lines can achieve - so while you may not get that speed, it turns out that your VPN isn't slowing you down.

As a matter of fact, Hotspot Shield's ratings haven't always been that high, but the provider recently upped its game, ranking fourth in our guide to the best VPN services. It's great for streaming and unblocking websites, torrenting, gaming, and general day-to-day protection.

We rate ExpressVPN as the best service on the market, with a slick app and excellent performance, but it is quite expensive at $6.67/month; NordVPN is another close competitor that offers a bit more in terms of all-out power, but is still $4.13/month At $4.13 per month, it is considerably more expensive.

In short, if you are looking for a simple, effective, and fast VPN, Hotspot Shield may be the right choice for you.