Mullvad has silently revamped its Android VPN app — here’s what you need to know | Tech Radar

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Mullvad has silently revamped its Android VPN app — here’s what you need to know

The update brings an interactive server map and a new multi-hop function

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Mullvad has released version 2026.10 of its Android app

A rotatable globe and advanced multi-hop feature are the main highlights

The VPN has also reported a glitch affecting connection

Mullvad has released version 2026.10 of its Android VPN app, introducing new features designed to boost speed and security while making the overall user experience more fun.

An interactive map showing VPN server locations and an advanced multi-hop feature, alongside a few bug fixes, are the key additions in this release, currently available on Git Hub.

Interestingly, Google Play has yet to list the upgrade, with Mullvad still showing the previous version 2026.08 as its latest release on the official website, too.

The new redesign was quietly announced on the cloud platform over the past two days, following months of meticulous preparation that had already included the release of new features in beta in August, with the VPN testing them for almost a month before the launch.

Meanwhile, the Sweden-based VPN continues to ensure transparency, alerting users to an issue with the new version and reflecting the accountability expected by the best VPNs.

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Mullvad: best VPN for anonymity A major player in the industry and a great advocate for privacy, Mullvad is one of the only VPNs that still lets you pay with cash for true anonymity. Offering advanced security features, it effectively blocks ads and malicious domains, with great speeds too.

The new version features a rotating globe that highlights server locations available to users, making the discovery process more immersive and playful. Users can now zoom in, pan, scroll, and explore the globe region by region to discover the exact locations of all VPN servers, as well as view their own connection routes.

Additionally, its multi-hop function, which routes traffic through two servers for additional privacy and to make it easier to route your traffic, can now be enabled automatically when relevant settings require it and off when it is unnecessary.

The multi-hop feature is a staple of Mullvad’s functionality — indeed, it first reached Android in 2025, following earlier arrivals on desktop and i OS, when Mullvad had labelled it “a tunnel within a tunnel.”

However, by selecting the new button, you won’t need to manually enable the function, as the Android VPN app will now activate it automatically when it’s called for.

This becomes particularly relevant when DAITA, a security technique that obscures network traffic patterns to prevent interception, is enabled and the selected servers do not support it directly, but you still desire a high level of security.

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Specifically, the system will now recognise this preference and will automatically activate multihop mode, as DAITA requires it or benefits from it in order to function effectively. If you disable DAITA, the system will automatically revert to a faster, single-server connection to save you bandwidth, allowing the VPN to maintain its fast speeds reputation.

The VPN has also optimised the server location search function. Specifically, the results displayed in the ‘Select location’ field are now sorted by relevance, based on how closely they match users’ queries. Approximate search results have also been included to recognise imperfect matches and improve the overall user experience.

Finally, a few bugs have also been fixed, such as the sorting of the list of positions in English and previous revocation flags appearing during an API rejection.

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Only two days ago, Mullvad released version 2026.09. However, the release contained an error that could cause the tunnel to get stuck in connecting and disconnecting when the QUIC obfuscator is used, causing the entire tunnel state machine to freeze and requiring the app to be restarted.

While the new version has indeed fixed the glitch in the previous version— and for this reason, the VPN explicitly advised to abandon version number 09 — it also warned that 2026.10 may cause the first connection attempt to fail when using features such as quantum-resistant tunnels or Daita.

A future release is expected soon to fix the connection issue, Mullvad said.

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Silvia Iacovcich is a tech journalist with over five years of experience in the field, including AI, cybersecurity, and fintech. She has written for various publications focusing on the evolving regulatory landscape of AI, digital behavior, web 3, and blockchain, as well as social media privacy and security regulations.

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