How to Watch Twitch in China?

Is there a way to watch Twitch in China? Yes, it is possible unblock Twitch in China. Twitch is newly blocked by the Chinese firewall. Users can’t load website to watch game. To access Twitch in China, you need to bypass the censorship. We will show how to unblock Twitch in China in this article.

Can’t Watch Twitch in China?

Chinese users who would like to watch gaming on Twitch could be disappointed because this service is censored in China. Twitch is a leading live-streaming video service. On this platform, you can stream World of Warcraft, League of Legends, Fortnite, FIFA 19, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, Grand Theft Auto and Battlerite Royale etc. It gained soaring popularity among Chinese users during the Asian Games hosted in Jakarta, Indonesia. As the local TV channels did not air the e-sports matches, Chinese users flocked to download Twitch app to watch the games. It was the most popular way to the esports event. Twitch had hit the No. 3 most popular free apps in China back then. Unfortunately, it was blocked by the Chinese government soon. Its app also has been removed from Apple’s Chinese App Store. Twitch has confirmed that this service is blocked in mainland China and no streaming can be initiated or watched there. You have to circumvent the government censorship to watch Twitch in China.

Why is Twitch Blocked?

Why is this popular platform blocked by the Chinese government? So far, there is no official statement to explain the reason of blocking by Twitch or the government. In fact, it’s not the first time Chinese government blocks western websites. Since 2009, a huge number of websites and applications are banned in this country. Google was blocked after it refused to remove specific terms from the search results. Facebook and Twitter were banned after the government found people used them to plot to do illegal things secretly. YouTube was blocked after a video of Chinese riots had been widely spread on the Internet. Some contents of those services brought trouble to the Chinese government, but Twitch didn’t cause bad influence on them. Why is Twitch blocked in China? Some users believe that the Chinese government issues the blocking in order to control the information flow and what Chinese citizens can see on the Internet. As they can’t control what contents showed on foreign platforms, they choose to block those platforms to prevent potential threat to the government. Once a western website becomes popular among Chinese users, it will probably be blocked soon. The Chinese government concerns that the uncontrolled media may harm the unity of the nation. Other users assume that this is the government cracking down on the country’s gaming addiction issues. Many teenagers spend whole day at Internet café without eating and resting. They even quit school to play video game and steal money to purchase gaming weapon. The government tries to fix those issues by controlling the gaming boom. Luckily, you can use a VPN to overcome the restriction to watch Twitch in China properly.

Strict Internet Censorship in China

The blocking of Twitch upsets the Chinese gamers badly. Due to the censorship, they can’t watch their favorite game videos on Twitch. Actually, China has a long history of frequently blocking access to a large number of international resources, especially western social media platforms. The Chinese government realized the power of media. They learnt a lesson from the past that uncontrolled media could ruin a developing country. Hence, the government has created the most advanced firewall system to implement the strict Internet censorship. They employ thousands of people to manage its censorship program. The Great Firewall of China is a very important part of the Golden Shield Project. It helps the government block millions of websites and applications, highly monitoring users’ online activities. The firewall uses Deep Packet Inspection method to monitor and analyze incoming and outgoing connections. It can detect that you are trying to access Twitch in China. Traffics it deems not fit will be blocked. Search engines will not show results with banned terms, social media companies will crack down conversations about sensitive subjects. The firewall blocks access to websites based on their domain names. Related domain names and key words are added in the list of firewall as the blocked content. It also checks for banned terms on a page’s URL as well as the URLs of any images or videos a page loads. Sensitive websites and topics will be filtered. The firewall detects users’ IP addresses which are the numerical references of where users live. If it detects Internet request to blocked websites from a China-based IP address, it will corrupt the DNS request and show you error instead of letting you access the website. This is the whole process how Twitch is blocked by the firewall. If you want to watch Twitch in China, you need to circumvent those methods.

How to Watch Twitch in China?

Do you know how to watch Twitch in China? Yes. The most popular and efficient way to watch Twitch in China is using a VPN. What is a VPN? VPN stands for Virtual Private Network. It is widely used for accessing blocked websites, overcoming geo-restrictions, protecting privacy and safeguarding online traffic. The VPN creates a virtual tunnel between your device and a remote server. It allows you to switch to different servers offered by the provider. Those servers are distributed around the world. When you are connected to those servers, your IP address and virtual location are changed to another city or country. That enables you to bypass location-based restriction. VPN also utilizes encryption to scramble the packets of data and use special protocols to disguise your connection. It wraps each data packet inside another packet before delivering it to the remote VPN server at the other end of the encrypted tunnel. In this way, the firewall system won’t see the IP, URL, or DNS requests that your devices make. The ISP, firewall and government don’t view your real location, see your connection or track you Internet. When you want to watch Twitch in mainland China, connect to server in the US. Others will believe that you are located in the US. As your connection is encrypted, your ISP can’t spy on you and don’t know you are visiting Twitch. The firewall won’t censor you, so you can unblock Twitch in China successfully.

Best VPNs to Unblock Twitch in China

There are various VPNs out there on the market. Which one is the best choice to use in China? If you are about to pick a VPN to bypass the Chinese firewall, you should note that not all VPNs work in China. As many famous international websites and applications are blocked, VPNs become more and more popular in China. The government also notices people are using VPN to bypass their firewall. Therefore, they take measures to crack down VPN connections. Lots of famous VPNs fail to work in China. The firewall blocks VPN tunneling protocols to prevent users from using VPN to access blocked contents. Therefore, you need to choose a VPN which supports protocols suitable for China network. For example, OpenVPN is the most popular protocol because of the latest encryption technology. However, it has been targeted by the government. Sometimes, it does not function properly in China. Some providers give up while some providers overcome this problem by obfuscating OpenVPN to look like normal HTTPS traffic with OpenVPN over SSH feature. In such way, users can watch Twitch in China as well as maintain high security.

Besides, PPTP, L2TP/IPsec and SSTP are better choice to bypass the firewall, but some of them lack of security. Chameleon, StealthVPN and SoftEther are the best choices because they are specially developed to trick the firewall into believing the traffics are regular https connections. Some VPN supports multiple hops to obfuscate your connections to make encrypted and proxy traffic undetectable to escape from censorship. Some VPN providers change the IP addresses on their servers and constantly adjust their VPN setup to avoid blocking. Some VPNs can successfully break through the firewall at this time, but may be blocked tomorrow because China is a leading role in censorship. They update the firewall actively to control the network to the maximum extent. In order to bypass surveillance & censorship and unblock Twitch in China successfully, you need the best VPN for network in China.

Here are the features the best VPNs for China should include. Firstly, compatible protocols and advanced encryption are required. That is an important factor to decide whether it works with the firewall. You need to check if it provides desired level of security. With more protocols and tunnels, you have more options to handle various traffics. The flexible encryption methods will allow you to switch between watching Twitch, playing game and downloading folder freely. Secondly, the provider is supposed to offer server close to mainland China. Streaming game videos requires high speed and stable connection. When you connect to server in Hong Kong, Japan or Singapore, it reduces the time in rerouting your data, thus delivering better connection. Thirdly, great VPN for China should embrace torrent and offers great anonymity. A VPN which allows torrent does a great job in protecting users’ privacy. Shared IPs, Internet Kill Switch, DNS leak protection and zero traffic log privacy policy are necessary to keep your private information completely safe. Your IP address won’t be exposed and other private data won’t leak. That ensures you can overcome the firewall and access Twitch in China steadily.

Detail of Best VPNs

ExpressVPN:

ExpressVPN is one of the most trusted, secure brands in the virtual private network industry, and that’s for good reason. It has has Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows applications. It’s superfast and extremely safe, boasting an SSL-secured network with 256-bit encryption and, get this, unlimited bandwidth and speed. All its plans are fully refundable and covered by 30 days money-back guarantee. No questions asked.

Get ExpressVPN Special Deal: 12 Months + 3 Months FREE (Save 49% OFF)

Get ExpressVPN 49% OFF

PureVPN:

PureVPN is a one-stop solution for online security, anonymity and privacy that guarantees the fastest VPN speed and highest level of security worldwide by providing you with 750+ servers in 140+ countries across the globe. You can enjoy complete web freedom with the industry leading encrypted e-privacy and e-security.

Get 2 Years of PureVPN For The Price of 1 (Save 75% OFF)

Get PureVPN 75% OFF Now!

NordVPN:

NordVPN has a strict zero log policy and uses two security protocols: OpenVPN with 2048-bit SSL encryption and the 3072-bit IKEv2/IPsec that is currently the most secure protocol available in the market. Additional security features, such as DNS leak protection and double data encryption, are also available. Its IP addresses and wide VPN servers enable you to avoid government censorship and geo-restriction. What’s more, the NordVPN service is based in Panama, which has no data retention laws, meaning that none of your data is recorded, stored or passed to anyone.

Get NordVPN unlimited VPN service for only $3.29 per/month! (Save up to 72% OFF)

Get NordVPN 72% off Now!

Tips for Unblocking Twitch in China with a VPN

To ensure the best Internet speed, you are suggested to connect to servers close to mainland China. When you connect to server in Hong Kong, Singapore or Japan, it reduces the time lag in communications. You can watch Twitch in China via fast and stable connection. It will be better to switch Internet kill switch on. Your connections to the Internet will be shut down when VPN drops. That prevents other from taking this chance to snoop at you. The ISP won’t detect you are watching Twitch in mainland China. We do not suggest you use protocol with less security to bypass the firewall. PPTP is fast, but it does not come with the best encryption. You may suffer cyberattack or data leak when streaming videos on Twitch. Besides, you are suggested to choose a VPN which is optimized for China. There are too many limits and regulations in Internet use. The provider should adjust VPN to suit the strict network to avoid being cracked down. Do not try to search for or spread sensitive topics about China. That can attract the Chinese government’s attention and cause VPN account blocking. Download the VPN Client compatible with your device and the operating system and set it up properly. You had better activate VPN account and set it up before you fly to mainland China. Many VPNs’ websites are blocked. You can’t purchase or download them from their websites. Get everything ready before the trip to ensure you can access the Internet without any problem after arriving in China.

What else You can Do with a VPN in China

VPNs not only help you unblock Twitch in China, but also bring other more benefits to users. It is a useful tool with multiple functions. As Internet users’ privacy has been invaded badly, more and more people use VPN to reclaim their privacy. VPN hides your IP address and stops ISPs from spying on your online activities. It also prevents advertisers and snoopers from tracking every aspect of your life. It wipes the digital footprint you leave when you surf the web. You become anonymous. Besides, many users need VPNs to make their Internet connections more secure. You may regularly connect to WiFi hotpot when you need to surf the Internet. However, you should note that they may be insecure. WiFi hotspot network at public places like coffee shops, hotels, or airports are wide open. Every user connected to the WiFi hotspot shares the same network connection. Hackers can make use of advanced tool to steal passwords and other personal data via the shared connection. The VPN will safeguard your connection with military-grade encryption, so no one can intercept your session or steal information. Powerful VPNs assist you to access blocked streaming content that’s normally only available inside certain regional zones. For instance, VPNs enable you to unblock exclusive US or UK content in mainland China. You can access Netflix and BBC iPlayer there without limit. VPNs also are great tool for torrent users. It keeps your personal information safe, so you can download via torrent privately and safely.

Best VPNs for China or Other Prohibited Countries

Learn more in this short video

Conclusion (How to Watch Twitch in China?)

The Chinese government puts a lot of effort into Internet censorship. The firewall use DNS blocking, connection blocking, keyword blocking and page scanning to prevent users in mainland China from accessing Twitch in mainland China. Though the firewall is a huge monolithic barrier, there is still a way to bypass it. IP mapping and traffic encryption will help you escape from the censorship. That’s how a VPN helps. VPN enables you to create private and secure connections to remote servers outside of mainland China. Once you are connected to a VPN server, your data travelling back and forth between your device and that server will not trigger the Great Firewall’s IP Filtering technology. It makes you appearing from different region or country, so you can be free from the strict Censorship. Some users may wonder if it is legal to watch Twitch in China with a VPN. Though the government highly censors users’ activities, they do not issue any law to rule that accessing blocked websites and using VPN are illegal. It is impossible for them to completely block western websites or VPN because travelers and expats in China need VPN to unblock their favorite social media platforms to keep in touch with their friends. Businessmen need some western services to cooperate with foreign enterprise. As long as you don’t use Twitch and VPN to conduct illegal activities, you are fine. Feel free to use VPN to watch Twitch in China.

Submitted by Josh M. Grove October 19, 2018