Lightway: A modern VPN protocol by ExpressVPN
Delivering a VPN experience that’s faster, more secure, and more reliable. It’s Lightway, now on ExpressVPN apps for Android, iOS, Windows, Mac, Linux, and routers.
What is Lightway?
Lightway is ExpressVPN’s pioneering VPN protocol, built for an always-on world. It makes your VPN experience speedier, more secure, and more reliable than ever. Designed to be light on its feet, Lightway runs faster, uses less battery, and is easier to audit and maintain.
A VPN protocol forms the foundation of a VPN service, shaping every aspect of your experience. Most providers use the same off-the-shelf protocols, but ExpressVPN has engineered its own. And we’re constantly improving Lightway, including reimplementing it in the Rust programming language for even greater security and performance.
Now coded in Rust
To keep Lightway on the cutting edge, we’ve reimplemented it from C into Rust—a programming language that’s matured in recent years to become one of the most powerful and popular among developers for high-performance systems.
This required a total overhaul of Lightway and the result is a leaner, better-performing VPN protocol that can be easily improved upon and that others can adopt. Reimplementation in Rust also served to fundamentally enhance Lightway’s security: Because certain threats simply cannot exist in Rust, associated attack vectors and human errors are automatically eliminated.
Better speed and performance
ExpressVPN has already been ranked the fastest VPN by TechRadar, Tom’s Guide, and others—but Lightway has improved on those speeds. It’s also made it faster to get connected to the VPN, often in just a fraction of a second.
With Lightway’s new simpler and more expressive code base in Rust, you can expect more performance features to come that will significantly improve download and upload speeds.
Secure and transparent
Lightway uses wolfSSL, whose well-established cryptography library has been extensively vetted by third parties, including against the FIPS 140-2 standard.
The core codebase of Lightway has been open-sourced and is available on GitHub, ensuring transparency to our users. Cure53 has also conducted two independent assessments on Lightway to confirm its security—once in 2021 and the second time in 2022. Following Lightway’s reimplementation in Rust, we also commissioned new audits by Cure53 and Praetorian in 2024.
Fewer connection drops
If you’re switching between networks or your signal drops out, Lightway doesn’t skip a beat. That’s because your VPN connection becomes idle, not terminated. Whether you’re switching from Wi-Fi to mobile data or stepping in and out of an elevator, you’ll maintain the same connection, to the same ExpressVPN server.
This means your VPN connection picks up the moment your device gets back online, ensuring no interruptions to your browsing or security. In many common situations, such as waking a device from sleep mode or deactivating airplane mode, the time it takes for the ExpressVPN connection to become active again is virtually imperceptible.
Post-quantum protection
Advances in the quantum computing space could undermine today’s cryptography, making it possible for encrypted information to be decrypted in the future. But our users have a headstart.
Lightway includes post-quantum protection by default, shielding you against attackers with access to both classical and quantum computers. The protocol now leverages ML-KEM, the recently chosen NIST standard for post-quantum encryption, to future-proof users’ data.
Download ExpressVPN on all your devices
A single ExpressVPN subscription lets you download a VPN for every popular platform. Need a VPN for multiple devices? Set up ExpressVPN on everything you own, and use it on eight at the same time.
‘A step up from other VPNs’
Don’t just take it from us—here’s what beta users had to say:
I really love the Lightway protocol. I love being able to connect instantly and not wait. And I love how there is less battery drain. Now I can’t even tell the difference if I’m using a VPN or not.
The instant connection is exceptional. Definitely a step up from other VPNs.
Lightway is extremely fast and efficient when compared to the OpenVPN protocol! Great work!
Get the only VPN with the speed and security of Lightway
Lightway is now available in the ExpressVPN apps for Android, iOS, Windows, Mac, Linux, and routers.
Don’t have ExpressVPN yet? We’re so confident in our product, we’re offering a 30-day money-back guarantee.