ExpressVPN vs IPVanish

ExpressVPN and IPVanish solve different kinds of friction. ExpressVPN gives you Smart DNS and a jurisdiction outside the Five/Nine/Fourteen Eyes alliances; IPVanish removes the paid-plan device cap and adds multi-hop routing.

Paid plans do not make you count devices

IPVanish's paid plans do not make you count simultaneous devices. ExpressVPN uses a connection cap rather than an unlimited-device model. If the VPN is going onto phones, laptops, tablets, and TVs across a household, this is the difference you will feel most often.

Multi-hop is another direct separator

IPVanish has a confirmed multi-hop route in the current feature set. Built-in multi-hop is not part of ExpressVPN's confirmed feature set. It matters only if you deliberately want an extra VPN hop, but in this pair the capability clearly points to IPVanish.

Smart DNS gives you another device path

ExpressVPN includes Smart DNS in its current streaming toolkit. Smart DNS is not part of IPVanish's current feature set. If the problem is a device where a normal VPN app is awkward, that can be more useful than another simultaneous connection slot.

The registered jurisdiction differs too

ExpressVPN is registered outside the Five/Nine/Fourteen Eyes surveillance alliances. IPVanish is registered in a Five/Nine/Fourteen Eyes member country. Jurisdiction is not a privacy guarantee by itself, but it is a real structural difference if you include it in your checklist.