Windows 11 on Arm PCs are about to get a significant boost in security and privacy. NordVPN, a popular tool for securing devices by hiding your IP address, will soon have an Arm-native version. This is excellent news for people who already have a NordVPN subscription or are interested in grabbing one for use on an Arm-powered PC like the Surface Pro 11 or Surface Laptop 7.
“We are building an Arm-native NordVPN application and the launching process is in the final stages,” said NordVPN to TechRadar. “We are now in close cooperation with Microsoft to receive a driver signing certificate. We expect to release the application in the near future.”
VPNs on Copilot+ PCs / Windows 11 on Arm
At the moment, you cannot use NordVPN on a Windows on Arm PC, even through emulation. While the best experience will come by using native Arm applications, Windows on Arm PCs can run other apps through emulation. Running non-native apps got a boost in the form of Microsoft’s Prism technology, but there are still some apps that will not work on Arm-powered PCs.
The first wave of Copilot+ PCs, all of which run on the Snapdragon X Elite or Snapdragon X Plus, have received positive reviews (in the future there will be Copilot+ PCs with non-Arm chips). Generally speaking, the best native Arm apps perform great on these PCs and non-native apps run fine.
“An important aspect of the Snapdragon X platform is how the emulated apps feel when used. On older generations of Windows on Arm chips, running even basic apps under emulation felt slower than running an Intel or AMD machine,” said our Editor-in-Chief Daniel Rubino in our Surface Laptop 7 review. “That’s no longer the case here on Snapdragon X. Many of the apps I’ve tried that run under emulation feel fine, with no scrolling lag or frame dropping when navigating through an app.”
While performance of those non-native apps is generally fine, efficiency drops when using apps that are not native to Arm. There are also some apps that perform noticeably slower in emulation. NordVPN and some other apps are not able to run on Windows 11 on Arm at all due to drivers or other limitations.
Certain apps not working with — or working well on — Windows on Arm PCs is a deal breaker for some. It doesn’t matter how sleek the designs of the Galaxy Book4 Edge or other laptops if those PCs can’t run the apps you need. The addition of an Arm-native version of NordVPN should close a noticeable gap in the Windows on Arm ecosystem.
