Surfshark (Сёрфшарк ВПН) in Russia: does it work and where to download it

Surfshark is a paid VPN from the Dutch company Surfshark B.V. with 4,500+ servers in 100 countries, but it has no servers in Russia. The app has been missing from the Russian App Store since July 2024, and on October 26, 2026, a search on the Russian Google Play storefront returned a lookalike from another publisher as the first result. Surfshark itself admits that some users in Russia have problems with the service. You can't pay for it with a Russian card: since March 2022, cards from Russian banks haven't worked abroad.

If you need a service that installs from the Russian Google Play and disguises traffic as ordinary HTTPS, we recommend BessyConnect. Details and an honest comparison below.

What is Surfshark (Сёрфшарк ВПН) and who is behind it?

Surfshark is a commercial VPN published by Surfshark B.V. of Amsterdam. Since 2022, the company has been in the same group as Nord Security, the developer of NordVPN. There is no free plan: the app stores give a 7-day trial, and the website gives 30 days to get your money back for a first purchase.

Besides the VPN, the subscription includes the CleanWeb ad blocker, an antivirus, the Alert service for leak checks and Alternative ID for generating a "spare" email address and personal details. There is a Kill Switch, the Dynamic MultiHop double server, Bypasser split tunneling and a camouflage mode that, according to the Google Play description, "disguises a VPN connection as a regular internet connection".

Does Surfshark VPN work in Russia and why won't it connect?

The short answer: it works unreliably and not for everyone, and Surfshark itself gives no guarantees. On its Russian-language help page, updated February 18, 2026, the company writes: "We are aware that some users in Russia are experiencing problems with the VPN service." The suggested solution is to connect manually over WireGuard.

The history of the problems:

• No servers in Russia. As of October 26, 2026, Russia isn't on the official list of 100 countries; the nearest locations are in neighboring countries.
• December 11, 2022. Android, iOS and desktop apps and the Chrome extension stopped connecting for users in Russia. RTVI reported this on December 11 and Habr on December 12, 2022. The outage hit subscribers of MTS, Tele2, Yota, MegaFon and part of Beeline. Roskomnadzor didn't directly confirm a block, but reminded users that VPN services not connected to the FGIS (the state registry of banned sites) are prohibited in Russia.
• August 2023. On August 9, 2023, The Insider reported mass failures of the OpenVPN and WireGuard protocols on mobile networks. These are exactly the protocols Surfshark runs on.

Reviews on the Russian Google Play storefront confirm this. The official app's average rating there is 2.1 from 320 thousand reviews, compared with 4.6 on the US storefront. The most helpful reviews date from December 2022 and early 2023: the subscription is paid, but it won't connect.

If you have Surfshark installed and it won't connect, check these in order:

1. Change the protocol in the settings: OpenVPN (UDP or TCP), WireGuard, IKEv2. According to Surfshark's help center, OpenVPN uses obfuscated servers.
2. Pick another country manually, preferably a neighboring one: the list includes Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Armenia and Turkey.
3. Switch between mobile internet and Wi-Fi. If it connects on one network, the carrier is the one restricting it.
4. Turn off any second VPN and "Private DNS" in your phone's settings.
5. Try setting up WireGuard manually following the guide in Surfshark's help center.
6. Update the app and make sure it is the original from Surfshark B.V. or SURFSHARK LTD, not a lookalike.

If nothing helps, the carrier is most likely recognizing the protocol itself. That can't be fixed on the user's side. How WireGuard and OpenVPN differ from VLESS and why the former are easier to spot is covered in our comparison of VLESS, OpenVPN and WireGuard, and a general checklist is in the article why a VPN isn't working.

How much does Surfshark cost and can you pay for it from Russia?

Prices on the website are shown in the currency of the country you open it from, and almost always with a discount: on October 26, 2026, the pricing page was running a Black Friday promotion. There are three plans: Surfshark Starter, Surfshark One and Surfshark One+, for 1, 12 or 24 months. The US App Store gives a reference point in dollars.

Paying from Russia is difficult for three reasons:

• Cards. According to Surfshark's help center (updated August 7, 2025), it accepts bank cards, PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay and cryptocurrency, though cryptocurrency doesn't work when paying from a phone. Cards from Russian banks don't work abroad: on March 5, 2022, Visa announced that its cards issued in Russia would stop working outside the country.
• Google Play. Since March 10, 2022, Google Play payments have been suspended for users in Russia, and in-app subscriptions can't be purchased (Google Play Console Help).
• App Store. Surfshark isn't in the Russian App Store, so you can't buy a subscription through a Russian Apple ID either.

A separate caveat about refunds. Under the terms of service (updated July 13, 2026), the 30-day guarantee doesn't apply if the subscription was bought through an intermediary other than Paddle, Google Play and Cleverbridge, or if it was paid with a prepaid or gift card. If a third-party service makes the payment for you, you most likely won't be able to get your money back through Surfshark. Back in December 2022, according to Habr, the support team warned that refunds for the remainder of a subscription might not be available for Russia.

How to download Surfshark on iPhone, Android and PC?

There are two official sources: the surfshark.com website and app stores in other countries. For Russia, both come with caveats.

iPhone and iPad. A query to Apple's catalog on October 26, 2026, returns zero results for Russia and Belarus. The app was removed from the Russian App Store in July 2024 along with other VPNs: on July 4, 2024, Novaya Gazeta Europe wrote about 25 apps removed at Roskomnadzor's demand and named Surfshark among them. The app is available in the App Stores of the US, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Georgia, Uzbekistan and Turkey. To install it, you need your own Apple ID from another country. What to do about a VPN that has disappeared from the store is covered separately: VPN disappeared from the App Store.

Android. The official app doesn't come up in search on the Russian Google Play storefront, while on the Kazakhstan storefront it is first. Surfshark's website has an official APK file: about 156 MB, updated October 21, 2026, runs on Android 6.0 and later. Don't install modified "premium" APKs from software catalogs: under the same name you may get someone else's build.

Computer. Here Surfshark is stronger than many: the website has installers for Windows (including for ARM processors) and Mac, a Linux package in the Snap Store, and Chrome, Firefox and Edge extensions for the browser. You don't need an Android emulator on your computer. The main difficulty on a PC is the same as on a phone: payment.

Which "Surfshark VPN" apps on Google Play aren't from Surfshark?

On the Russian Google Play storefront on October 26, 2026, we found three apps named Surfshark that don't belong to the Surfshark company. The original is published by Surfshark B.V., with the package com.surfshark.vpnclient.android and more than 10 million installs.

The VLESS DEV app has two discrepancies. Its "Data safety" section states "No data collected", while the privacy policy on Google Sites says the app collects the device's IP address, usage time and Firebase Analytics data. The contact address in that policy is support@hirovpn.com, the email of an entirely different service, HiroVPN. The same publisher has the apps «Хиро ВПН» (Hiro VPN), Streisand VPN and some fifteen other VPNs. In reviews from September–October 2026, users write that the app freezes and that the subscription can't be canceled.

How to tell the original: the publisher is Surfshark B.V., the address in the "About the developer" section is Kabelweg 57 in Amsterdam, and the email is support@surfshark.com. More on the signs of clones in the article how to spot a fake VPN app.

Is Surfshark safe?

On paper, yes: it is one of the few VPNs with an external audit of its no-logs policy. In June 2025, Deloitte conducted an audit under the ISAE 3000 standard for the second time, covering regular, static and multiport servers. The full report is available only to customers in their account; publicly there is a summary on the Surfshark blog dated June 16, 2025.

What the privacy policy (updated October 12, 2026) says:

• visited websites, browsing history, connection times and traffic volume aren't stored;
• for the duration of a session, the server keeps the user ID, IP address and connection time, and this data is deleted within 15 minutes after the session ends;
• AppsFlyer, Firebase Analytics, Iterable and Purchasely are used for app advertising and analytics;
• payment partners receive the transaction date, the payer's IP, the card number and the cardholder's name.

The App Store listing says email, identifiers, usage data and diagnostics may be collected but aren't linked to your identity. On Google Play, the developer states that data isn't shared with third parties and notes an independent security review.

Keep the jurisdiction in mind: the Netherlands, where the company is registered, is part of the "14 Eyes" intelligence alliance (dev.by, for example, wrote about this on May 21, 2024). For those who choose a service by its country of registration, this is a factor.

What to replace Surfshark with: comparison with alternatives

If Surfshark connects reliably for you, there is no reason to switch: it has more platforms, an external audit and an unlimited number of devices. You need a replacement when it won't connect, or when you can't pay for it or install it.

Proton VPN is covered in detail in our article Proton VPN and AdGuard VPN in Russia. If you came from one-button apps with loud names, our review of popular VPNs in Russia is useful: it uses the same criteria we used to check the Surfshark lookalikes.

Why we recommend BessyConnect

We recommend BessyConnect to those whose Surfshark has stopped connecting or who are held back by payment. The VLESS protocol with Reality camouflage makes traffic look like an ordinary HTTPS connection. This is a different approach from WireGuard and OpenVPN, which Surfshark is built on. There are more than a hundred servers, no logs are kept, registration is optional, and there is a trial period.

BessyConnect apps:

• iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple TV — App Store
• Android — Google Play
• Android TV — Google Play

Where Surfshark is stronger, to put it plainly. It has clients for Windows and Linux and browser extensions, an external Deloitte audit, servers in 100 countries and a set of extra tools such as an antivirus. BessyConnect has no Windows app.

What neither BessyConnect, nor Surfshark, nor any other VPN solves. If mobile internet has been restricted to whitelists, a VPN as a rule won't help. BessyConnect won't refund or transfer a subscription you paid for Surfshark. And neither Surfshark nor BessyConnect is in the Russian App Store: on an iPhone, both require your own Apple ID from another country.

If Surfshark has stopped connecting for you or you can't pay for it, try BessyConnect during the trial period: all versions are on the download page.

Frequently asked questions

Does Surfshark work in Russia in 2026? Unreliably. It has no servers in Russia, and Surfshark itself, in a help article dated February 18, 2026, acknowledges problems for some Russian users and recommends setting up WireGuard manually.

Is there a free version of Surfshark? No. There is a 7-day trial in the app stores and 30 days to get your money back for a first purchase on the website. Apps named Surfshark that promise free access are made by other publishers.

Can I download Surfshark on a PC? Yes. The surfshark.com website has installers for Windows and Mac, a Linux package and extensions for Chrome, Firefox and Edge. You don't need an Android emulator.

Why isn't Surfshark in the App Store? It was removed from the Russian App Store in July 2024 at Roskomnadzor's demand along with other VPNs. It is available in App Stores of other countries, such as Kazakhstan or Armenia.

What can I replace Surfshark with if it won't connect? We recommend BessyConnect: the VLESS protocol with Reality camouflage, no logs kept, optional registration and a trial period. BessyConnect has no Windows app, and on an iPhone you need an Apple ID from another country.

Related articles

BessyConnect Review: Protocol, Servers, Apps & Privacy

An honest BessyConnect review: a VLESS+Reality VPN with 100+ servers in 15 countries, apps for iOS, Android and Android TV, and no browsing logs kept. More

Amnezia VPN: what it is, how to download it, where to get a server

Amnezia VPN is a free open-source client: how to download it for PC, Android and iPhone, how self-hosted, Premium and Free differ, and where to get a key. More

Happ VPN: What It Is, Where to Get Keys, How to Set It Up

Happ VPN is a client app with no servers of its own. Where Happ keys and subscriptions come from, how to set it up on phone and PC, and why it won't connect. More