Methodology

Every comparison on CrateNorth follows the same routine, so a pick in one guide means the same thing as a pick in another.

Define the job first

We start by listing what decides the outcome for the person buying: for a VPN that means logging policy, audits and speed; for hosting it means uptime record, support and renewal cost. Marketing features that rarely matter in practice get little weight.

Gather evidence from several sides

For each candidate we read the vendor's documentation, terms and pricing pages, check independent audits and test results where they exist, and look through months of user reports to find problems that only show up over time.

Say where the verdict comes from

If our team has used a product, the guide says so and shows what we saw. If a verdict rests on research rather than hands-on use, the guide says that too.

Scoring

Picks get a score out of 10. Each category has four criteria (privacy, speed, ease of use and value for a VPN, for example); each criterion is scored and the overall number is their plain average.

Scores are editorial judgments based on the evidence above. They are not customer star ratings, nobody pays for them, and they are meant for comparing products inside one guide rather than across categories.

Keeping pages current

Each guide shows its last update date. We recheck picks when plans or products change and before major sale periods.

Independence

Vendors cannot buy placement or a better score. Referral fees exist, but they never decide the order of a list; see the disclosure.