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Cybersecurity · head to head

IVPN vs Sigstore

I

IVPN

Cybersecurity

Privacy-focused VPN with anonymous account numbers instead of email signup

From
$6/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Sigstore logo

Sigstore

Cybersecurity

Free public signing and transparency infrastructure for open source artifacts

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Sigstore has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: IVPN has no free tier, unlike several consumer VPN competitors with limited free plans.; Sigstore the security model depends on somebody watching the log. The documentation states that compromise of an identity provider or of Fulcio itself is detectable only if third parties monitor the transparency log, the monitoring tool is a community-tier rather than core project, and almost no consumer runs one.
  • They diverge on capability: IVPN covers Anonymous account numbers, Sigstore covers Fulcio.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which IVPN and Sigstore actually diverge.

Attributes where IVPN and Sigstore differ
AttributeIVPNSigstore
Starting price$6/monthFree
Pricing modelsubscriptionOpen source, public instance free to use
Free tierNoYes
Platformswindows, mac, linux, ios, androidWeb, Linux, macOS, Windows, Self-hosted

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Cybersecurity).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in IVPN

  • Anonymous account numbers
  • Multi-hop connections
  • Independent audits
  • WireGuard and OpenVPN support
  • AntiTracker

Only in Sigstore

  • Fulcio
  • Rekor
  • Keyless signing
  • Multi-language clients
  • Timestamp authority
  • Neutral governance

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

IVPN

  • Signing up for a VPN without providing an email addressnot Sigstore
  • Verifying a VPN's no-logs claims via independent auditsnot Sigstore
  • Layering multi-hop routing for higher-anonymity browsingnot Sigstore
  • Blocking trackers and ads via built-in AntiTrackernot Sigstore

Sigstore

  • Open source projects signing releases without running a certificate authoritynot IVPN
  • Organisations meeting a signed-artifact requirement without buying a signing productnot IVPN
  • Publishing provenance that a consumer can verify independently of younot IVPN
  • Self-hosting the same components where a public log is unacceptablenot IVPN

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

IVPN

  • Has no free tier, unlike several consumer VPN competitors with limited free plans.
  • Standard plan's two-connection limit is lower than many rivals offering five or more devices.
  • Smaller server network than large mainstream VPN providers, which can limit streaming unblocking.
  • Pricing is higher than budget VPN competitors for comparable simultaneous-connection counts.

Sigstore

  • The security model depends on somebody watching the log. The documentation states that compromise of an identity provider or of Fulcio itself is detectable only if third parties monitor the transparency log, the monitoring tool is a community-tier rather than core project, and almost no consumer runs one.
  • It is a 99.5 percent objective with no service level agreement, which permits several hours of downtime a month and offers no remedy. A pipeline that signs on every build has taken a hard dependency on a free service with no contract behind it.
  • Log scale is a live engineering problem rather than a theoretical one. The active shard holds billions of entries, the log has already been sharded twice, and sharding version 1 requires stopping traffic, which is why a replacement was built.
  • Ten-minute certificates make trust depend on log availability. Verifying an older signature relies on the log entry proving it was made inside that window, so a lost or unreachable entry can render a valid artifact unverifiable.
  • Migration debt is substantial and ongoing. Version 2 of the log is generally available but not the public default, the signing client has an announced breaking release ahead, some official clients lag the new log format, and a post-quantum migration is named as the next break after that.

Pricing, plan by plan

IVPN

$6/month
  • Standard$6/month
    • 2 simultaneous connections
    • $60/year billed annually
    • WireGuard and OpenVPN support
  • Pro$10/month
    • 7 simultaneous connections
    • Multi-hop connections
    • $100/year billed annually

Sigstore

Free
  • Public good instanceFree
    • Free to everyone with no contract
    • 99.5 percent availability objective, not an agreement
    • 100KB cap per attestation upload
  • Self-hostedFree
    • Apache-2.0
    • Run your own Fulcio and Rekor
    • Rekor v2 available for self-hosters

Which should you pick?

Choose IVPN if

  • You need anonymous account numbers.
  • You work on windows, mac, linux, ios, android.
  • You also want multi-hop connections.
IVPN review

Choose Sigstore if

  • You need fulcio.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows, Self-hosted.
  • You also want rekor.
Sigstore review

Questions people ask

Is IVPN or Sigstore better?
Neither clearly leads. IVPN starts at $6/month and Sigstore at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, IVPN or Sigstore?
Sigstore has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $6/month for IVPN and Free for Sigstore.
Does IVPN or Sigstore run on more platforms?
IVPN runs on windows, mac, linux, ios, android. Sigstore runs on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows, Self-hosted.
Can I use Sigstore for free?
Yes. Sigstore has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. IVPN starts at $6/month.
What is IVPN best used for?
IVPN is most often used for signing up for a vpn without providing an email address, verifying a vpn's no-logs claims via independent audits, layering multi-hop routing for higher-anonymity browsing, blocking trackers and ads via built-in antitracker. Of those, signing up for a vpn without providing an email address and verifying a vpn's no-logs claims via independent audits are not what Sigstore is typically brought in for.
What can IVPN do that Sigstore cannot?
IVPN covers Anonymous account numbers, Multi-hop connections, Independent audits, WireGuard and OpenVPN support. Sigstore covers Fulcio, Rekor, Keyless signing, Multi-language clients.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Sigstore: Is the public instance really free?

Yes, with no contract and no paid tier. That is also the weakness: a 99.5 percent objective with no agreement, no remedy and support through Slack.

Sigstore: Has the public log moved to Rekor v2?

No. Version 2 reached general availability in October 2025 and self-hosters can use it, but the public instance still defaults to version 1 and the project has said it will for the foreseeable future.

Sigstore: Does Sigstore make my dependencies safe?

No, and this is a category error worth avoiding. It tells you who published something. It has no knowledge of what the artifact contains or whether it is vulnerable.

Sigstore: What are the rate limits?

Not published. Only the 100KB cap per attestation upload is documented, so do not design a high-volume pipeline around assumed throughput.

Sigstore: Should we self-host it?

If a public record of every signature is unacceptable, or if a free service with no agreement cannot sit in your build path, then yes. Otherwise the public instance is what most projects use.

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