NordVPN offers private DNS in its apps, which ensures tighter security and privacy for your traffic. The NordVPN native applications automatically use NordVPN's DNS servers when connected to VPN. This prevents DNS leaks during your VPN connection, ensuring that your NordVPN private DNS requests are safe.
NordVPN's DNS server addresses are 103.86.96.100 and 103.86.99.100. Learn how to change NordVPN DNS servers (more on it later).
Why use NordVPN DNS servers?
DNS servers translate human-friendly domain names such as www.google.com into IP addresses like 192.168.1.1 so your device can connect to websites. When you type a website address, your device asks a DNS server for the IP address. If the server doesn’t know it, it looks it up from other servers. Changing DNS servers provides you with increased security as well as speed. With default DNS you may be subject to DNS hijacking. DNS hijacking is a cyberattack where attackers redirect or alter DNS settings to send users to fake websites or malicious servers. This can lead to phishing, malware infections, data theft, or blocking access to legitimate sites. It often occurs through router vulnerabilities or malware.
How to change NordVPN DNS servers
You can configure your device manually to use private NordVPN DNS servers. This is handy when you are connecting to NordVPN from a non-native app (for example, third-party OpenVPN clients) or if there are any issues setting up the DNS addresses in the NordVPN app. You can alternatively use other preferred DNS servers.
Here are tutorials on how to manually set up NordVPN DNS server connections on your operating system:
Windows: Change your DNS servers on Windows
macOS: Change your DNS servers on macOS
Linux: Change your DNS servers on Linux
Android: Change your DNS servers on Android
iOS: Change your DNS servers on iOS