VPN for Android: a VPN on your phone with no ads and no needless permissions

Clients for Android: Happ and Outline

On Android we need the same two apps as on the other platforms, and the choice between them depends on the task. Happ is built on the XRay core, understands VLESS and ShadowSocks, shows the server list from the subscription and lets you switch protocols — it is the main option if you want control over the connection. Outline is arranged as simply as possible: paste the key, press the button, it works; it supports only ShadowSocks, but there is almost nothing to configure and nothing to break. Both clients are free, and the charge is only for access to the servers. Installing them side by side is possible, but only one connection should stay active: Android does not let two apps hold a VPN profile at once, and the second client will simply take the tunnel away from the first.

If the app is not in Google Play: installing from an APK

Android is convenient precisely because it does not lock the user into a single store. If the client has disappeared from Google Play or is unavailable in your country, it is installed straight from a file: the system asks once for permission to install apps from that source, and after that everything goes as usual. The single rule here that matters more than all the others is that a vpn apk may be downloaded only from the developer's official site or through the link in our dashboard. Builds from forums and file dumps are often modified: advertising modules are added to them, and sometimes code that reads the very traffic the VPN was installed for. After installation do not forget about updates: an app from an APK does not update itself, and every few months the version is worth refreshing by hand.

The VPN profile permission and the key icon

The first connection on any Android phone comes with a system window asking permission to create a VPN connection. This is a standard mechanism of the system itself rather than a demand of the client: Android explicitly warns that the app will be able to intercept network traffic and asks the device owner for confirmation. After the confirmation a key icon appears in the status bar — it always shows that the tunnel is up. The system network settings hold the other side of this mechanism: there you can designate an always-on VPN connection and block traffic that bypasses the tunnel. That pair is useful when a traffic leak into an open network is unacceptable: the phone simply will not reach the internet until the connection is up. If profiles from old apps have piled up in the list, the extra ones are better deleted — they should not conflict, but they do create confusion.

Battery and background limits on Xiaomi and Samsung

Complaints of the 'the VPN drops when the screen turns off' kind almost always concern the manufacturer's shell rather than the protocol. Xiaomi in MIUI and HyperOS aggressively unloads background apps by default, so the client needs autostart permission and its power-saving limits removed in its settings card. Samsung has similar logic: the app may end up in the sleeping list, and then the system kills it after a few hours of idling. The cure is the same — excluding the client from battery optimization. VLESS itself spends the charge sparingly: the encryption is light, the session recovers quickly after a network change, and the difference from working without a VPN is small. If the connection still breaks after the limits are removed, the cause is the network rather than the phone — switch the server or the protocol in the client.

• Allow the client to autostart in the shell settings
• Exclude the app from battery optimization
• Check whether the client has ended up in the sleeping apps list
• Do not unload the client by swiping it out of the recents list

Split tunneling by app

Split tunneling is the ability to choose which apps go through the VPN and which go directly. It comes in handy more often than it seems: a banking app may refuse to work from a foreign IP, while food delivery or a taxi service shows the wrong city. It is enough to exclude them from the tunnel, and the rest of the traffic keeps going through the protected connection. Support for this feature depends on the client rather than on our service, so look into the settings of the app you installed: if there is a section for choosing programs, mark the ones you need, and if there is none, the tunnel covers the phone's entire traffic. The second option works too, it is just less flexible: in that case a banking app is easier to open with the connection switched off.

Telegram, MTProto proxy and Android TV

If the only task is a stable Telegram, you can sometimes do without a full tunnel. A personal MTProto proxy is created in the dashboard: the link opens right in the messenger, and it offers to connect the proxy with a single tap. This works only for the app's own traffic and requires no system VPN profile, but since February 2026 Telegram has been throttled on Russian networks, and a proxy alone is not always enough — if the messenger still opens badly, bring up the full tunnel. It is also what you need when the whole device has to be protected — the browser, mail and other services. TV sets and boxes on Android TV are a separate story: installation there repeats the phone one, but you have to control it with a remote, and some clients are inconvenient on a big screen. A detailed breakdown with all the options, including setup through a router for TV sets on webOS and Tizen, is on the page about VPN for a TV.

What to do when the connection drops

Drops on a phone are almost always explained by one of four reasons: the client has been unloaded by the system, the subscription is out of date, an unlucky server has been selected, or the time has drifted. Check them in exactly that order. First remove the power-saving limits, then refresh the subscription in the app, then switch the server and try the second protocol — VLESS and ShadowSocks are filtered differently, and moving from one to the other often removes the problem in seconds. Do not forget the clock: a drift of more than half a minute breaks the setup of a ShadowSocks connection. If it breaks only when moving between Wi-Fi and a mobile network, turn on the always-on VPN connection in the Android system settings. When nothing has helped, write to the support bot or to support@rgvpn.pro and state the phone model, the Android version, the shell and the client — that is usually enough to find the cause.

• Remove the power-saving limits for the client
• Refresh the subscription using the link from the dashboard
• Switch the server and try the second protocol
• Turn on the always-on VPN connection in the Android settings
• Write to support with your phone model and system version