I purchased a gigabit streaming device, one which was reviewed favorably here, and without vpn Ethernet = 900+ mbs and WiFi 800+ mbs. With Surfshark on I get between 60-110 mbs Ethernet and 50-90 mbs WiFi no matter which protocol or city tried. I am using Analiti. So I tried Proton vpn and the results were virtually the same. I would appreciate some of your knowledgeable insight.
The primary reason speeds are slowed by a VPN is the overhead of encryption, let me take a guess, your using a Firestick or similar small device and running the VPN on it.
Try Proton on your Phone, or a newer laptop. If they perform noticeably better then you now know why. If it is the same then something else is factoring in and I don’t have enough information to give you a decent answer
The problem is the cost in performance for the CPU to encrypt/decrypt and process packets and streaming device just don’t have powerful CPUs, additionally not all VPN providers use well resourced end points and free ones tend to have very busy servers.
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I’m probably in the minority but I dumped Analiti for Internet Speed Test (on Google Play) because even with the dramatic drop I know we have to expect, I thought Analiti’s numbers were always lower than what seemed realistic to me based on my gear and internet account. Even though the two were not TOO far off, I still feel like Internet Speed Test is more realistic and I also like the interface better. Even the low speeds you’re getting should be just fine to stream with but for my two cents, I’d suggest trying a different app and definitely use Ethernet IF you’re getting better speeds than Wi-Fi.
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Agree with everything said so far. You might want to try another ethernet cable but honestly with the current speed without vpn shouldn’t really matter. The speeds you have with the vpn should stream 4k just fine but I agree there is a bottleneck somewhere.
What type of box do you have?
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if able, setup the vpn on your router. my speed went from 70 -100 with vpn on the streaming device (formuler and firestick 4k) to 200-250 on 400 meg service.
i hear you but the problem with setting it up on your router is some sites such as banking email and other financial sites don’t like vpn’s even when you allow thru on the vpn the financial site can still see it and don’t like it…much more easy to turn it off for the device your using
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Call your ISP provider and tell them to reset/reboot or restart your router. Whenever I have slow speeds, whether by VPN or not, once they perform that I am once again able to get the speeds I’m supposed to get 
true, I don’t have that issue. possibly the vpn can be channeled to specific devices if router has tunneling feature.
Just to add another note @Miki often mentions his VPN speed with Proton and I have no doubt about most of his claims.
@Miki also uses a Nvidia Shield, one of the reasons it’s an expensive device is it includes a 256 core GPU.
A GPU speeds up graphics but it is more general purpose than that, it will actually handle any repetitive task including encryption/decryption, more importantly it does so in parallel. (256 cores).
That’s why he gets great performance with the shield and a VPN, it’s not about the VPN as much as it’s the value of the Nvidia Shield which is a great device.
Firesticks, Onn boxes even routers aren’t necessarily designed to handle CPU intensive encryption/decryption.
Excellent points @Timwort . Yes the shield may handle ethernet connections more easily than other less spec heavy devices, but don’t play down the “VPN Accelerator” coding of the Proton VPN either. Efficient code helps a great deal and even with my lowly Firesticks Proton gave me better speeds with Proton than without. Thanks for giving us all more to consider and think about. Valuable info thanks.
For comparison, on a BuzzTV box with 4GB Ram, an ISP provided 500GB Hub, using Ethernet exclusively, Surfshark VPN engaged, i’m getting in the neighbourhood of 165 - 195 Mbps consistently. I live on the East Coast of Canada and the Boston server (preferred) is my closest server. As a previous commenter stated, RAM is crucial and I suggest running your device lean using TechDoctorUK’s APP KIller & Cache Cleaner. Having done all that adopt Surfshark’s suggestion for using alternate DNS’s as well as trying their other suggestions. In my experience as a former Firestick user, the device is critical and those cheap 2GB devices with slower CPU’s just don’t cut it in delivering the goods. Good luck!