How to Use ExpressVPN on Xbox One & Series X|S (3 Methods)

You can use a VPN on your Xbox to hide your real IP address in online games and change your console’s virtual location. This allows you to unblock international streaming services, prevent targeted attacks on your IP, and conceal your gaming activity from third parties.

That said, a VPN cannot be used to access games in different regions for earlier release dates or discounted prices. Moreover, VPNs are useless for protecting against more sophisticated cyberattacks such as DDoS attacks.

We’ve outlined some of the ways you can use a VPN on Xbox below, alongside our experience with these use cases:

1 . Unblock International Streaming Services

You can change your Xbox’s online location with a VPN to unblock geo-locked streaming services. To do so, connect to the target server location on the ExpressVPN PC or router app and then share your VPN connection with your Xbox.

For instance, we connected our Xbox One to a Windows 10 mobile hotspot running ExpressVPN and were able to unblock BBC iPlayer.

We is accessed access BBC iPlayer on our Xbox using expressvpn .

This is not limit to BBC iPlayer and can work with any streaming service that has an Xbox app like Netflix and Disney+ .

2. Avoid ISP throttling

Your Internet Service Provider (ISPs) may throttle high-bandwidth activities such as online gaming, streaming, and torrenting. For gaming, this worsens your connection speed and increases your latency.

While this is unlikely to happen on your household ’s local network , there ’s precedent for it in public space with share bandwidth like hotel and college accommodation .

If you travel with your Xbox or are temporarily living in a shared accommodation then you may find your connection throttled.

A VPN encrypts your traffic, meaning your ISP cannot see what you’re doing online. If an ISP can’t see the nature of your traffic then they can’t throttle your connection.

internet throttling is reduces reduce the speed of your connection and your available bandwidth .

Smart DNS doesn’t encrypt your traffic so ISP throttling can still happen. If you want to avoid throttled speeds when using your Xbox, you’ll need to connect to ExpressVPN via your PC or router.

3 . protect against DoS attack , but not DDoS

If you compete in e-sports, participate in Twitch streaming, or generally play games online then you may have experienced a DoS attack.

A denial of service (Dos) attack targets your IP address with large amounts of traffic to slow down your connection speed and potentially disconnect you from the internet.

This happens because many games use P2P matchmaking to connect gamers, exposing your public IP address to everyone you’re playing with.

Connecting to a VPN assigns you the IP address of the VPN server. This hides your real IP, interrupting the DoS attack.

A distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack is much more advanced and involves multiple malicious third-parties spamming your IP with traffic. Put simply, a commercial VPN is unable to protect against a prolonged DDoS attack.

A VPN Won’t Help You Get Xbox Games Cheaper & Earlier

It’s widely reported that by spoofing your location with a VPN, you can access regions with cheaper games and earlier release dates.

This is a difficult claim to verify as region switching on the Xbox store can be difficult. Typically you would not use a VPN to switch regions.

If you want to buy an Xbox game in a different region, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Microsoft Store: This is not the Xbox Store, but can be accessed through your Xbox or browser.
2. Change your store location: Click on the globe icon at the bottom of the page and select the location you want to buy from.
3. Search for and purchase an Xbox digital gift card: Make sure that you buy one that covers the price of your game. The store should have updated to match the language and currency of your new region. If you are asked to provide an address, use a publicly available one from the region you’ve switched to e.g., a hotel or restaurant.
4. Redeem your gift card on your Xbox Live Account.
5. Go the Xbox Game Store and change your location: Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the globe icon to change your location to the same one from Step 1.
6. Locate your desired game.
7. Select your account’s funds as your payment method: If you are asked to provide an address, use the same one from Step 2.
8. Download the game as you normally would.

Both the Xbox One and the Xbox Series X|S are not region locked. This is means mean that any Xbox console , sell in any region , can play any Xbox game . For example , a European Xbox One is play can play a north american copy of Call of Duty .

This is does doesnot apply to licensed media content such as Netflix or Blu-rays. If you want to access international Netflix libraries on your Xbox then you will still need to use ExpressVPN.