VPN apps removed from app stores: where and why in 2026

A VPN app can be live in one country and missing from the same store in the next one. Both stores remove apps country by country when a government demands it, and Apple also asks for a license where a country requires one. This post lists where the stores pulled VPN apps in 2025 and 2026, which rules they cite, and what a removal means for planning keyword campaigns.

Heads up. This is the state of the store rules and of the reports we could check on November 3, 2026. None of this is legal advice.

App Store: guideline 5.4 and the local law rule

Apple's App Review Guidelines cover VPN apps in guideline 5.4. The parts that decide where an app can be listed:

• Who can publish. Apps offering VPN services must use the NEVPNManager API and may only be offered by developers enrolled as an organization.
• User data. The app has to say what data it collects and how it uses it on a screen shown before the user buys or uses the service. It may not sell, use, or disclose that data to third parties for any purpose.
• Local law and licenses. VPN apps must not violate local laws. If you make the app available in a territory that requires a VPN license, you put the license information in the App Review Notes field.

Section 5 of the same guidelines adds the general rule: apps must comply with the legal requirements in every location where you make them available. Apple pointed to this rule when it removed a VPN client in Russia in October (see below).

A removal on a government demand is local. Apple's App Store Transparency Report for 2025 says such apps are removed only from the country or region where the requesting authority has jurisdiction, and remain available everywhere else.

Google Play: the VpnService policy

Google Play's VpnService policy decides which apps may open a device-level tunnel:

• Core function. Only apps that have VPN as their core functionality can create a secure device-level tunnel. A short list of other categories is exempt, among them parental control, device security, and remote access tools.
• Listing and encryption. The app must document its use of VpnService in its Google Play listing and encrypt the data from the device to the tunnel endpoint.
• Data and traffic. It may not collect personal and sensitive user data without prominent disclosure and consent, and may not redirect or manipulate other apps' traffic to make money.

The policy page does not mention local VPN licenses. Country removals on Google Play come from government orders. In India, for example, Google disclosed the orders to Lumen, Harvard University's database of takedown requests, TechCrunch reported.

Where the stores pulled VPN apps

Russia, App Store. Apple removed 1,213 apps at the request of Russian authorities in 2025, out of 2,045 removals on government demands worldwide, according to its transparency report. That is the largest number of any country in the report. The report does not break the number down by category. A year earlier the figure for Russia was 171, Meduza reported. In 2026 the reports name specific VPN clients:

• March 2026. The VPN clients Streisand, V2Box, and v2RayTun were removed from the Russian App Store, according to Human Rights Watch and The Moscow Times. The notice v2RayTun received cited a demand from Roskomnadzor, Russia's internet regulator, and said the app included content illegal in Russia, HRW reported.
• June 2026. The VPN client Happ disappeared from the Russian App Store and came back a few days later, The Moscow Times reported.
• October 27, 2026. Apple removed the VPN client Incy from the Russian App Store at Roskomnadzor's request, its developers said. Apple's letter referred to the rule that developers must follow the laws of the countries where they distribute their apps. Incy stays available in other countries, The Moscow Times reported.

Russia, Google Play. Roskomnadzor issued removal orders for 233 Google Play apps in March 2026 alone, TechRadar reported, citing the outlet iStories. According to TechRadar, Google appears to be resisting most of these orders, and it is unclear how many apps were removed. In February 2026 a Russian court fined Google 22.8 million rubles for failing to remove VPN apps, HRW reported. So in Russia this year one store removed VPN apps by name, and the other, as far as the reports show, mostly did not.

India, both stores. In early January 2025, more than half a dozen VPN apps, among them Cloudflare's 1.1.1.1, Hide.me, and PrivadoVPN, were pulled from the App Store and Google Play in India on orders from the Ministry of Home Affairs, TechCrunch reported. TechCrunch called it the first significant enforcement of India's 2022 rules for VPN providers, which require them to keep customer records, including names and IP addresses, for five years. Several VPN providers still serve Indian customers but have stopped marketing their apps in the country, according to the same report.

China, App Store, since 2017. China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology required all developers offering VPNs to obtain a government license, and in July 2017 Apple removed VPN apps that did not meet the rule. Apple said the apps remained available in all other markets, TechCrunch reported. The license clause in guideline 5.4 covers this kind of country.

Pakistan, licenses since November 2025. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority started licensing VPN providers in November 2025 and named five licensed companies, Arab News reported. The report does not say whether unlicensed VPN apps were removed from the stores.

What this means for keyword campaigns

Plan countries from where the app is listed. A campaign needs a store page in the country to land on. Search for your app's name in each target country on both stores before you start, because the two stores do not always act together: in Russia this year the App Store removed VPN clients by name, while Google Play mostly did not, according to the reports above.

A removal closes one country. Apple removes an app on a government demand only in that country or region, so the listing elsewhere stays. A campaign planned for the country where the app was removed has nowhere to land. Campaigns in other countries are not affected by that removal.

In license countries, the license comes first. If a country requires a VPN license, Apple asks for it in the App Review Notes. Without one, do not plan a campaign there.

If the app comes back, check before you spend. Happ returned to the Russian App Store a few days after it disappeared. We have not measured how a position behaves after an app returns to a store, so check where your app stands for its main keywords before you restart a campaign.

Where Rankforge fits

• Campaigns run only where the app is listed. A keyword campaign lands on a store page in that country. If the app is removed there, we cannot run a campaign in that country, and we cannot bring the app back to the store. Which countries you may offer a VPN in is a question for your lawyer.
• The tracker shows the listing country by country. Add your main keywords for each target country, free and without a card. If the app drops out of one country's results, the chart shows the day.
• Both stores are covered. On the App Store a campaign can run on live installs, made by people. On Google Play there are two types of installs, Premium and Standard, both automated, and they leave no ratings.

Related reading

The same breakdown for crypto wallets and exchanges is in Crypto apps in 2026: store rules country by country. For a security app, one of our case studies shows what a position does after the campaign stops: an antivirus app in Australia through three weeks of keyword installs and the six days after them.