What does it mean when there's a loading icon next to the VPN icon at the top of my iPhone screen?

This has happened with two different VPN providers now. I’ll notice that when clicking on a link, loading a web page, or viewing a web page with lots of content on it, a little spinning loading icon will appear next to the VPN icon at the top of my screen. The icon usually goes away fairly quickly once the page has loaded up, but occasionally it’ll stay if the page has a lot of images or gifs on it.

Does the loading symbol simply indicate that the page is loading, or does it say something about the VPN connection itself? I want to know if the loading symbol is an indication that the VPN has disconnected and is trying to reestablish its connection. The first VPN provider I used had this problem, where the VPN would disconnect all the time and still show the VPN icon when the VPN was either disconnected or trying to find a connection, leaking data in the process. Now I’m spooked.

I think there is nothing to worry about, the loading icon usually appear if the web page is loading or the iphone is processing something at the back. If you are really concern of IP leak, then you should invest into a VPN that offers internet kill switch or DNS leak protection.

I get this spinning icon all the time, even when not connected to a VPN. It means something is still loading on your page/app or something’s syncing somewhere on your phone.

Cool, thanks for letting me know!