Comparison

Privacy.com vs Proton Wallet

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Privacy.com

Safeguard your online transactions by creating virtual payment cards. Protect your actual financial details from compromised cards, unexpected charges, and recurring subscription fees. Enjoy enhanced security and control over your spending with customizable limits and real-time monitoring.

Highlights
  • Create virtual payment cards
  • Merchant-locked cards
  • One-time-use cards
  • Customizable spending limits
  • Real-time transaction monitoring
  • Pause/unpause/close cards
Features
Read full description

Stop exposing your credit or debit card information and protect your online payments with Privacy. Join over 250,000 users who have saved millions of dollars by using Privacy to block unwanted charges from compromised cards, overcharging, hidden fees, and forgotten subscriptions. Getting started with Privacy is simple: create your account, verify your information, securely link your bank account or debit card, and request your first virtual card. Start shopping and enjoy the added layer of protection Privacy provides to protect you from payment card theft and fraud. Benefits: - Shield your true financial information: Our Privacy Cards mask your debit card or bank account number to help protect you from card theft and fraud. Pay with greater privacy and security anytime, anywhere on desktop or on mobile. - Create merchant-locked and one-time-use cards: Our cards automatically "lock" to the first merchant they are used at, so if the merchant is ever breached, the card number can never be used anywhere else. You can also create one-time-use cards that automatically close after a single transaction. - Take complete control over your spending: Set customizable spending limits to prevent overcharging and block hidden fees—perfect for managing subscriptions and recurring expenses. If a transaction goes over the limit, we will automatically decline it. - Leverage real-time transaction monitoring: Receive notifications any time a Privacy Card is used. Easily pause, unpause, and close Privacy Cards any time with just one push of a button. Privacy’s core product is free to use on domestic transactions, because, like other card companies, we collect transaction fees from merchants. Privacy Cards can be used at most merchants that accept credit and debit cards. The security of our users’ personal information and data is critical to everything that we do at Privacy. You can review our security policies at https://privacy.com/security. Read about us in Forbes, Wirecutter, and The Wall Street Journal! For support, questions, or more information, please contact us at support@privacy.com.

About

Proton Wallet

This app provides a secure and user-friendly way to manage Bitcoin, giving users full control over their funds. It offers features like multi-device support, encrypted transactions, and a unique email-based sending option for enhanced privacy and ease of use.

Highlights
  • Sole control of BTC
  • Intuitive experience for newcomers
  • Seamless multi-device support
  • End-to-end encryption
  • BIP39 standard seed phrase
  • Bitcoin via Email feature
  • Automatic BTC address rotation
Features
Read full description

Proton Wallet is a secure, easy-to-use crypto wallet that gives you sole control of your BTC. We designed Proton Wallet for Bitcoin newcomers, offering an intuitive experience while ensuring only you can access your BTC. Unlike other self-custodial wallets, Proton Wallet offers seamless multi-device support so you can use your wallet from any mobile device or web browser. Similar to how Proton Mail made encrypted email easy-to-use for 100 million users, we hope Proton Wallet can help everyone around the world safely use Bitcoin in a peer-to-peer and self-sovereign way. ** Not your keys, not your coins ** Proton Wallet creates your wallet using a BIP39 standard seed phrase, ensuring seamless recovery and interoperability with other self-custodial wallets, including hardware wallets. This also means you can easily import existing wallets or recover your Proton wallets on other services. Your encryption keys and wallet data are protected with end-to-end encryption, so no one else — not even Proton — can access them. Proton Wallet makes storing and transacting with Bitcoin simple while encrypting all your sensitive data, giving you financial sovereignty and privacy. Proton servers cannot access your BTC and do not even know your historic transactions and balances. ** Freely transact onchain ** The Bitcoin network is the most decentralized, censorship-resistant and secure financial network. Every transaction from Proton Wallet is mined by the Bitcoin network and recorded forever on the Bitcoin blockchain so no one can dispute it. You will pay the current network fee to Bitcoin miners to include your transaction in the blockchain, but no transaction fee is charged by Proton Wallet. Proton Wallet is free for everyone because we believe financial freedom and privacy should be available to all. ** Send Bitcoin via Email ** Bitcoin transactions are permanent and there's no bank you can call if you make a mistake. Copying the wrong 26-character Bitcoin address can be catastrophic. Proton Wallet's unique Bitcoin via Email feature means you only need to verify another Proton Wallet user's email instead, reducing the likelihood of errors. Each BTC address is cryptographically signed with PGP by the recipient's app, ensuring that it belongs to the recipient. ** Keep transactions and balances private ** Due to our incorporation in Switzerland, your data is protected by some of the world's strictest privacy laws. We also minimize data on servers by encrypting all transaction metadata (including amounts, senders, recipients, and notes) on user devices. Each time you receive BTC from someone with Bitcoin via Email, we automatically rotate your BTC addresses, protecting your privacy and making it difficult to connect your transactions on the public blockchain. ** Multiple BTC wallets and accounts ** Proton Wallet makes it easy for you to create multiple wallets, each with its own 12-word seed phrase for recovery. Inside each wallet, you can also create multiple BTC accounts to organize and separate your assets for better privacy. After the default wallet, subsequent wallet creations support an optional passphrase as another layer of protection. Free users can have up to 3 wallets and 3 accounts per wallet. ** Protect your Bitcoin with Proton ** Choose a crypto wallet that's transparent, open source, optimized for Bitcoin, and puts you in control. You can protect your wallet with two-factor authentication and activate Proton Sentinel, our AI-powered advanced account protection system that identifies and blocks malicious logins. Our 24/7 specialist support team is always ready to assist you. Download Proton Wallet now and start protecting your financial freedom. For more information, visit our website: https://proton.me/wallet To learn more about Bitcoin, read our guide: https://proton.me/wallet/bitcoin-guide-for-newcomers

Screenshots

Privacy.com4 screens
Proton Wallet4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Proton Wallet at 65% against Privacy.com's 39%. Proton Wallet also leads on monetization model (free vs free with in-app purchases) and rating (4.8 vs 4.5). Privacy.com's advantage is ratings volume (7.2K vs 270). On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Proton Wallet holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Privacy.com has 7.2K ratings behind it against 270, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 39% of Privacy.com's written reviews are positive against 65% of Proton Wallet's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Privacy.com ships an update every 4 weeks, Proton Wallet every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 29, 2026 and October 28, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Privacy.com versus Proton Wallet: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPrivacy.comProton Wallet
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.5 (7.2K ratings)4.8 (270 ratings) — better
Positive reviews39.0% of reviews64.9% of reviews — better
Number of ratings7.2K — better270
Update frequencyEvery 4 weeksEvery 3 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.1 — better16.0
Further details — not scored
Size55 MB163 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPay With Privacy, Inc.Proton AG

Customer experience

Privacy.com

All ratings7,157 ratings
Positive88.6%
Neutral1.3%
Negative10.1%
Written reviews177 reviews
Positive39.0%
Neutral4.0%
Negative57.1%

Proton Wallet

All ratings265 ratings
Positive95.5%
Neutral1.1%
Negative3.4%
Written reviews57 reviews
Positive64.9%
Neutral10.5%
Negative24.6%

User reviews

Privacy.com

From 7.2K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Excellent protection
  • 🔒 Total control
  • 👍 Incredible
  • 🔒 Essential app
  • 👍 Happy user for YEARS

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Great service, HORRIBLE new app
  • 🐛 DISAPPOINTED THEY DONT BLOCK THEFT LIKE THEY CLAIM
  • 🐛 New UI and other irritations
  • 🐛 Card Not Supported
  • 🐛 Disabled my account

Proton Wallet

From 270 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 User-friendly interface
  • 🚀 Fast transaction speed
  • 🔒 Highly secure
  • 💡 Integrates with other Proton services
  • 👍 Easy to navigate for beginners

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Issues with buying/ordering process
  • 🌙 Lack of dark mode option

Bugs and requests

Privacy.com

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Half of the time I cannot open the app after it was closed as FaceID is broken and disables keyboard entry
  • Automatically pausing cards set up for annual payments
  • Transactions being authorized multiple times on one-time use cards
  • App crashing issues
  • Compatibility issues with newer debit cards

Requested features

6 requests
  • Ability to search transactions by dollar amount
  • Option to hide closed cards
  • Ability to preload cards for budgeting
  • Option to set cards back to no limit
  • Landscape mode support
Show 1 more
  • Browser extension

Proton Wallet

Reported bugs

2 issues
  • Locking users out of the app
  • Order cancellations after long wait times

Requested features

2 requests
  • Ability to hide real credit card details
  • Support for Ethereum, Solana, and XRP

In-app purchases

None

Privacy.com

No in-app purchases

None

Proton Wallet

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Privacy.com free?
Privacy.com is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Proton Wallet free?
Proton Wallet is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Privacy.com or Proton Wallet?
Proton Wallet is rated higher. Privacy.com averages 4.5 out of 5 from 7.2K ratings, while Proton Wallet averages 4.8 from 270 ratings.
Do Privacy.com or Proton Wallet have ads?
Neither Privacy.com nor Proton Wallet shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Privacy.com or Proton Wallet?
Privacy.com ships an update every 4 weeks, and Proton Wallet every 3 weeks. Most recently, Privacy.com was updated on October 29, 2026 and Proton Wallet on October 28, 2026.

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