NymVPN does not guarantee a new IP address every time you connect, but it doesn't tie you to a fixed one either. Each connection routes through a randomly selected gateway from the pool in your chosen country or region. Sometimes you'll get a new IP, sometimes the same one. Either way, your activity stays private because the network is decentralized and the gateway only sees encrypted traffic.
How NymVPN picks an exit IP
When you connect, NymVPN selects an exit gateway from the available pool in your chosen country. By default, the selection is random:
- If multiple gateways are available in your chosen country, you'll could get a different one each time you reconnect.
- If only one gateway is available for that location, you'll get the same IP repeatedly until more gateways come online.
- You can also choose a specific gateway manually using the country selector in the app, which gives you a stable IP for sessions where consistency matters (banking, certain logins, geo-restricted accounts).
You can see all available gateways on the Mixnet Explorer.
Why this design
NymVPN's privacy properties don't depend on rotating IP addresses. They come from the decentralized architecture of the network:
- In Fast mode, no single node sees both your real IP and your destination, regardless of which exit gateway you land on.
- In Anonymous mode, the 5-hop mixnet plus cover traffic and packet mixing prevents observers from correlating traffic to you, even if the exit IP is stable.
This is different from how traditional VPNs work. There, the exit IP is the main privacy boundary: if it leaks, your identity leaks. NymVPN's privacy is built into the structure of the network, not into the freshness of the IP.
A note on geolocation
The country shown to a website is inferred from the gateway IP by an IP geolocation database. These can sometimes be inaccurate. If a website shows the wrong country, see Why does an IP check show a different country than I selected?