On Wednesday, the first phase of the Sentinel Ecosystem's long-awaited new flagship app launch was completed, with the release of Sentinel Shield dVPN on Android.
The Android installation file (APK) can be downloaded directly from the Sentinel website below.
Sentinel Shield dVPN
The Sentinel Ecosystem's new flagship decentralized VPN (dVPN) application.
Screenshots of Sentinel Shield in action on Android.
More information about Sentinel Shield's launch can be found on the Sentinel team's official Medium post about the news.
Sentinel
For those interested in background on the history of Sentinel flagship applications, a summary on that is available later in this article.
Other Platforms
The latest on Sentinel Shield's upcoming iOS and desktop versions.
App Stores and iOS
The team expects the app to be live on the Google Play Store (Android) and Apple App Store (iOS) platforms on or before the 15th.
Other venues, such as F-Droid and Huawei AppGallery, have also been mentioned by people involved with development.
Desktop Versions
The Sentinel team plans to release Sentinel Shield on all major desktop platforms (Windows, Mac, and Linux distributions).
At this time, there is no estimated arrival date for any of those versions; however, a generic unbranded alpha test client for Windows has been available to community testers since March 16th. That unbranded client is used as a foundation for Independent dVPN's current Windows beta, and it is speculated (and reasonable to assume) that it will be the foundation for Sentinel Shield on desktops as well.
Breadcrumbs (Mac)
Meile dVPN (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Independent dVPN (Windows beta)
SOLAR dVPN (Mac)
Sentinel also powers the built-in dVPN feature within Decentr's Web3 internet browser (Windows, Mac, Linux).
A complete directory of all Sentinel Ecosystem applications on all platforms can be found on the Sentinel Documentation website.
Pricing
None of the disadvantages of a cVPN, and a fraction of their cost.
The monthly rate for a subscription on Sentinel Shield at launch is 1,333.33 DVPN per month, which is about $1.46 USD in value (as of May 11th, 2024). For contrast, the monthly rates for many centralized VPN competitors can approach about seven times that.
The chart below illustrates Sentinel Shield's low cost compared to major centralized VPN competitors. In our research for this article we were unable to find a single major, well-regarded cVPN with a lower monthly cost than Sentinel.
| Application/Software | Introductory Monthly Rate (USD) |
|---|---|
| Sentinel Shield dVPN | $1.59/month* |
| Mullvad VPN | $5.28/month |
| BitDefender Premium VPN | $6.99/month |
| Windscribe | $9.00/month |
| ProtonVPN | $9.99/month |
| Surfshark | $10.99/month |
| ExpressVPN | $12.95/month |
| NordVPN | $12.99/month |
* Will fluctuate based on market price of the Sentinel Coin.
[Source: Forbes]
Note that the cVPN prices listed above are introductory rates, meaning that Sentinel Shield's pricing is lower even when taking their steep introductory discounts for new users into account. On top of that, even if somebody purchased an annual plan from a major cVPN (which decreases the monthly rate even more dramatically) they would still be paying more per month than they would be by using Sentinel Shield.
Background
The context and history behind Sentinel Shield.
First Incarnation (2018–2021)
The original Ethereum-based Sentinel dVPN client surpassed 100,000 downloads across all platforms during its 2018–2021 lifespan.
Apps in the Sentinel Ecosystem frequently achieve levels of consumer adoption unheard of for blockchain-based dApps, as the frontend for dVPN applications is often indistinguishable from those of their centralized competitors. The original Ethereum Sentinel application was responsible for creating that paradigm, and the team and community anticipate that its refreshed Cosmos-based incarnation will continue that stellar legacy.
Cosmos Ecosystem (2021 to Present)
After Sentinel's transition to the Cosmos Ecosystem, the Ethereum client was retired. Sentinel's new, sovereign Cosmos blockchain finally enabled third-party app development using Sentinel's architecture.
SOLAR dVPN (left) and Independent dVPN (right), two of the whitelabel dVPN clients created by third-party teams since 2021.
Teams such as MathNodes, SOLAR Labs, and Decentr solely carried the mantle of application development in the ecosystem until the development of a new Sentinel flagship application was first publicly disclosed in September 2022.
Community Testing
After several months of closed development, public alpha testing on both Android and iOS began on February 3rd of this year. That community testing phase lasted until about May 5th. On that same day the decision was announced that the mobile editions of the app were going to officially launch, and that the release name was to be Sentinel Shield.
For further details on the app's recently-concluded testing phase, here is coverage by dVPN News from February:
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