Method
Every number here
has a date and
a source. Or it
doesn't appear.
This page exists so you can check our work rather than trust it. It also lists what we deliberately do not do — which is more useful than a list of what we claim to.
Three rules
Rule one — a figure without a date is not a record. Prices in this category change several times a year, and promotional stacking means two people can see two different totals on the same day. Every number we publish carries the date it was read and the region it applies to. If you cannot see a date on it, treat it as unreliable, including when it appears on this site.
Rule two — a blank is a finding. Where a provider does not publish a renewal rate, we print "not published" rather than an estimate. An estimated number inherits the authority of a real one without earning it, and the reader has no way to tell them apart afterwards.
Rule three — we read the checkout, not the banner. Advertising copy is written to be persuasive; the payment screen is written to be legally accurate. Where they disagree, the payment screen is the record. Where we could not reach a payment screen, the record says so.
If a claim cannot be checked by a reader in under two minutes, it is an opinion. Opinions are allowed on this site, but they are labelled as opinions and they never carry a number.
What we record
Four categories, all of them observable from outside the product.
Advertised price
The headline monthly figure, the term it applies to, and the currency and region it was shown in. Read from the pricing page on the date stated.
Checkout total
What is actually charged, including the number of months covered. This is where promotional months and tax appear, and where they usually differ from the banner.
Renewal rate
The standard rate applied after the first term. Frequently absent from the sales page; sometimes visible only in the account billing view after signup.
Published terms
Refund windows, logging policies, jurisdiction, and third-party audit reports with their stated scope and date.
Limits
What we do not do.
A method page that only lists strengths is a sales page. These are the boundaries, stated plainly, because they shape how you should read everything else.
We do not bench-mark
connection speeds
Speed depends on your line, your route, your ISP and the hour of the day. A single measurement from one location tells you almost nothing about yours, and presenting it as a ranking would be misleading with extra steps.
We do not publish
"best of" rankings
A ranked list compresses dozens of trade-offs into one number, then sells placement against it. Our tables are sortable instead — you choose the criterion, and the order follows.
We do not infer
unpublished prices
No conversions from other currencies, no extrapolation from a competitor's rate, no "typically around" figures. If it is not printed somewhere, it is not here.
We do not sell
placement
Some links on this site are affiliate links, disclosed on every page. No provider has been given a position in a table, a ranking, or a verdict in exchange for payment.
Corrections
Prices move. When a record is found to be wrong, it is corrected and the correction is dated — not silently overwritten. If a figure on this site does not match what you see at checkout, that is worth knowing about, and the fastest way to tell us is the contact page.
Records are re-read on a quarterly cycle — four passes a year, each one dated. A record older than 120 days is treated as stale and marked accordingly until it is confirmed again. We would rather show you a stale date than quietly refresh one.