FAQ

INTRODUCTION TO HOLA!

TROUBLESHOOTING

FASTER INTERNET

HOLA FREEDOM VPN

ANDROID

SECURITY & PRIVACY

MISC.

INTRODUCTION TO HOLA!

What is Hola?

Our goal is to make the Internet faster and fully accessible to everyone. Install Hola on your PC, phone or tablet to make your Internet faster, reduce data costs, and have unlimited access to information that is otherwise not available in your country, while protecting your online privacy. Hola works by sharing the idle resources of its users for the benefit of all.

Which operating systems, browsers and devices can I use Hola on?

Hola may be installed as a browser extension to Chrome (version 22 and up) and Firefox (version 23 and up) on Windwos and Mac PCs or as an app on Android. It is also available as an application (.exe) for Windows (for users that are using Internet Explorer). The Hola application for PC should also be used in countries with deeper censorship where the Hola extension does not work. All downloads are accessible directly from our home page. (Installation and use of Hola is subject to our Terms of service and Privacy policy). Hola does not yet run on the Safari browser, iOS and Windows media center.

Is Hola Free?

Hola is a free service. It is the only service of its kind that can remain free over time, since it uses the power of the community (Peers) as opposed to power-hungry costly servers. You may upgrade to Hola Premium, which entitles you to an even better service, does not use your device as a peer, and helps fund the Hola project.

About Hola Premium: Get Free Premium Service!! Go to our referrals page and get a free month for every one of your friends that signs up for Hola!

Is it possible to pay for Premium without automatically recurring payments?

If you'd like to manually buy each subscription period (month, year) separately, you can do the following:
  1. Go to the Premium page and start a monthly or annual Premium membership
  2. After completing the payment process, go to your account page
  3. Follow the instructions to turn off auto-renewal

How do I keep my Hola version updated to the latest version?

We update often with bug fixes and new features, and we keep your version of Hola automatically updated. Android users:Make sure to select 'Allow automatic updating' inside the Google Play app for Hola to stay up to date automatically.

I love the Hola service. How can I share my love?

We definitely need your help to make the Internet better! Here's what you can do:

TROUBLESHOOTING

Hola is on, but I still can't access the web page I want to see. What should I do?

Try each of these separately:

The Hola extension icon on my browser has disappeared, or is in a strange location. What should I do?

Try each of these separately:

I get this message: "Hola cannot work because another extension is controlling your proxy settings". What should I do?

Disable all your other extensions to check if that may have been the problem. If it was, enable them back one by one to find the culprit

I get this message: "There seems to be an error - Reload Hola". What should I do?

You could be receiving this message because you are behind a corporate firewall that Hola cannot pass through, or the Hola system may be down, or some other problem we are not able to pinpoint. If you are behind a firewall (e.g. at work), try connecting to a different network (different wifi for example), or outside of the company. Otherwise, try the following:
It could be that our servers are temporarily down (pretty rare), so try again in an hour, but write to us about it at help@hola.org in any case to let us know.

I have a Premium membership. Why is my status not updated to Premium?

Your Premium membership is associated with the account you used to sign in to http://hola.org when starting the membership. As long as you're signed in with that account you will appear as a Premium user.

For example, if you signed in with Google when getting the membership and now you are using your Facebook account, Hola will not recognize you as a Premium user.

The email you received from Hola after starting your membership indicates which account is associated with your membership.

If you used PayPal to pay for your membership, it may take a few minutes for the membership status to get updated.

In case you have Premium mebmership but still do not see that in your status, check the following:

Which information should I provide to Hola when reporting a problem?

If you have gone through the above troubleshooting steps and are still having problems, send us a bug report, and include as much of the following information as you can: Note: Many times resetting your PC/Phone and making sure that you have Internet connectivity will solve your problem.

I have problems with Hola on Firefox: sites are missing, I'm stuck on an old version, I keep getting redirected to install Hola for Firefox, etc.

Some old versions of Hola for Firefox installed from the Mozilla Add-ons store don't get automatically updated to the newest version of Hola.
Install the latest version now which includes more sites and bug fixes and automatically updates itself to the latest version.
Note:If you have uninstalled Hola but are still getting redirected, it's easy to fix! You can do it two ways:

I am having trouble using the Hola extension on my Mac, what can I do?

Troubleshooting for Android

If Hola isn't working on your Android device, it's possible we have a conflict with another application or system settings.
The following apps cannot run at the same time as Hola: Proxy settings:
Some cell phone operators pre-install Proxy IP settings on your phone, which won't let Hola run. Here's how to remove this setting: App is set to a different country with Hola but still does not work: Can't access a site even with Hola on:

Providing Hola with Android logs and screenshots for debugging

Sometimes we will need more information to help troubleshoot a problem you have, and will ask you to send us one or more of the following:

Hola service logs (svc.log):
Hola application logs (app.log):
Taking screenshots to help us:

I can't install the Hola client

Try the following:

What can I do if I suspect that Hola is causing a problem?

You can turn Hola off via the app: just click the orange smiley guy and click the on/off button to turn it off. When the Hola icon goes gray our service is off, and so everything should be just as if Hola is uninstalled. Now you can check again if Hola was causing the problem or not.

How can I turn Hola off?

Here are your different options for stopping Hola:

How do I uninstall Hola?

You can uninstall Hola as follows:

How do I stop Hola from starting automatically when Windows or Android start up?

I received my account verification email, but the link is not working.

If your verification link doesn't work, it's possible that it was broken by your email system. If the verification link isn't clickable or part of the link is cut off, please copy and paste the entire URL into your browser's address bar and press Enter.

It's also possible that the verification link has expired. We set the expiration time to be relatively short for your protection. We still have the account information that you entered, however. To request a new verification link, visit https://www.hola.org/my_account and sign in with your email address and the password you selected when you created the account. You'll be given the option to have a new verification email sent.

If you're still unable to verify your email address after 48 hours, please send us an email with a detailed description of the problem, and we'll do our best to resolve it.

I have a problem that's not on this list. Any recommendations?

Send us an email with details about your problem, and we'll try to figure out the problem with you.

I have feedback or an idea for Hola!

We love to hear feedback and ideas from our users! Send us an email!

FASTER INTERNET

How does Hola make the Internet faster?

The Internet is slowed down by server response times, Internet congestion, round trip times, and poorly written communication stacks in operating systems. Hola removes these bottlenecks by securely caching content on peers as they view it, and later serving it up to other nearby peers as they need it. Hola also compresses communication between peers to further speed the net. As more people install and use Hola, the faster and less congested it will be!

Do I benefit from having more Hola users in my area?

Yes. The more Hola clients in your area, the faster your Internet will go.

What do the Hola statistics mean?

The Hola statistics (available from the 'Acceleration' menu) show how the following:

I don't see any peer traffic in my stats. Is Hola still accelerating my Internet?

Probably. Hola uses the idle resources of these close peers to compress the data for you, to create multiple parallel connections to the webserver for you even when the content does not exist on those peers. This should make your Internet always faster, and much faster when you get peer assisted downloads.

As more peers join in your area, the faster your Internet will be - so get your friends and family to install Hola and make your Internet faster!

Will I consume more mobile data on my Android device because of Hola?

No. Hola actually reduces your mobile data usage through better, smarter data caching. Expect to save between 20-30% of data usage after a few weeks Also, your phone only acts as a Peer on the Hola Network when plugged in to a power supply and when connected to the Internet over a Wi-Fi network.

Why am I getting strange results when running Speedtest.net with Hola?

Speedtest.net downloads a file to your device to check your speed. The Hola cache "remembers" this file, as it "remembers" any information that you've downloaded in the past, and in the same way serves it to your browser from the cache upon a second test of Speedtest. This is similar to how Hola stores other information you see during your browsing (pictures, logos, videos, etc.) and serves them back to your browser from local cache instead of going out to the web to find it. So -- the 'crazy' results on Speedtest.net are due to how Hola really works - any time Hola detects that you are loading a file that you've already loaded in the past, it serves it to you from its very fast cache.
Why is caching important?: Say you watch a video on YouTube, and later you want to watch it again. YouTube will re-download this file EVERY TIME you load it. That can be a lot of data (especially over 3G). With Hola, this file stays in your cache, so subsequent loads are both super fast (no reason to fetch from the web) and save you money on your data plan.
So how can I really do a speed test with Hola? Download a file from some website, for example a movie trailer from hd-trailers.net (right-click or long hold > save link as), and time the download with and without Hola running. This is a much more accurate speedtest, and we expect downloads to accelerate by 3-10x, depending on a number of factors.

HOLA FREEDOM VPN

What is the Hola VPN?

To accelerate your Internet, Hola routes some of your internet traffic through other nodes in the Hola network, and thus servers may see the traffic coming from other IPs in the network. This has a very nice side effect -- it makes your IP harder to track, thus allowing you for more anonymity on the web when you want it. You could call this an extension of Google's "Incognito mode". We call this service the "Hola VPN". This is a VPN service similar to many such services that exist on the Internet, but is very easy to set up (one click) and is free and ad-free. It is useful for seeing how a web site looks like from a certain geography, for more secure browsing, for overcoming government censorship (e.g. seeing Facebook from a country that blocks it), for overcoming your corporation's Internet site blocking, for seeing a site in its native language (e.g. seeing the Spanish news site as it appears to Spanish users), and more.

Hola is free for private use. Businesses wishing to use Hola may contact us at bd@hola.org

How do I use Hola?

Go to a web site, press the Hola extension icon in your browser (or sometimes in your task bar), and choose the country from which you would like to access this site. Now Hola will switch your IP (your Internet address) to the country you selected so that you are virtually browsing from that country. Enjoy!

Hola is a 'community VPN' -- it is a generic routing platform provided by Hola, with thousands of 'routing scripts' that are created by the community. These scripts define how information is routed to the selected sites. Better routing rules mean faster browsing, more secure and more open use of web sites. Power users can write Hola scripts that will be automatically available to all Hola users (information on writing scripts is here).

My Hola is not working!

See our trouble-shooting section below.

How can I see Facebook from Iran, or other countries or corporations, which block or stand behind a proxy or firewall?

Install the Hola Windows or Android client (Install from hola.org). After installation click on "Hola Unblocker", then click on the Hola icon next to "Facebook".

How can Hola be so much faster and cheaper than alternative VPNs?

Typical VPNs need to maintain servers in various countries and to route your traffic through those servers in order to change your IP. This is very expensive. Hola is a network of peers that help each other to access censored content, thereby dramatically reducing the cost of the service. Where typical VPNs charge about $10 per month for the service, to cover their servers costs and make a profit, Hola can provide you this service as either ad-based, or a ad-free, uninterrupted service for a much much lower cost. We are using your subscription payment to improve the service for you, and to make a better Internet!

Why do I sometimes get a popup from Hola asking me if I want to access this page?

When Hola identifies a web page that many people in your country are using accessing through Hola, it figures that you may want to access this page via Hola as well. You can press "Yes" to access the page via Hola (this will show you a menu of routing methods people are using to access this page the page - typically best to choose the top one which is the most popular), or press "No" to continue browsing normally (you won't see this message again for this site).

How can I check what IP to the outside world I'm getting from Hola?

You can go to ip2location.com, and check what your "regular" IP is. Now change the flags on the Hola extension to any country you want -- The site will reload and will show you your new IP address!

ANDROID

On which Android versions does Hola work?

How do I use Hola on Android apps that I cannot find on the store?

Is there any way to hide the notification icon on Android?

Short answer - no. Long answer - Hola uses the VPN feature on Android to provide you with the speed and other capabilities. When an app uses the VPN feature, the Android operating system places the notification icon ('key') in the tray and the app cannot remove it.

Can I get Hola for my iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch?

Not just yet! We will be releasing Hola for the iPhone and iPad sometime in the future, but no target as of yet.
You can Follow Hola on Facebook and Twitter for the latest news and to stay up to date.

Does Hola work on AppleTV or any SmartTV/PlayStation/XBMC/embedded Android devices, etc?

Hola does not yet officially support these platforms, but this is coming soon! Follow us to know when this is available: Follow us on Twitter or Like us on Facebook

SECURITY & PRIVACY

How does Hola make me more secure?

While on the Internet you are constantly being tracked, probed and sniffed. You are tracked by the sites that you are looking at (which products are you browsing? which articles are you reading?), and possibly by your government, ISP and coorporation. You are also probed and sniffed, and thus open to identity theft. Change your IP when accessing sites is an extended measure in addition to your browser's "incognito mode", so that others cannot get information from your browser, and cannot track requests coming from your IP as belonging to you. Depending on the proxy rule you choose, Hola will also encrypt some or all of your traffic, making you even more secure from outside sniffing.

Why does Hola need the various permissions for the Chrome extension and the Android app?

We care about your privacy. Hola does not make this information public, and does not disclose or sell it to any third party.
In order to accelerate your data traffic and to route your traffic through other IPs, Hola must act as a proxy for your data thus requiring various data permissions.
We only ask for the permissions we need for the app to be at its best.
More details about the Android permissions needed can be find below.
Device & app history: Hola allows you to launch the apps we can unblock/accelerate which you have installed in your device.
Identity: Hola also needs to create an ID for your Android device which it does from the various hardware readings
Photos/Media/Files: We use the external storage of the device for caching and storing data
Device ID & call information: Hola uses peer to peer technology as a VPN proxy so we need to identify when the device idle, connected the WIFI and power supply so we won't waste your data plan, battery or slowing down your phone.

Does Hola share any of my personal information with the rest of the Hola community?

No. Hola handles your HTTP requests exactly like HTTP web proxies do according to the HTTP RFC standards, and in a similar way to how ISPs do it in the normal course of your browsing. That also covers 'Cache:' public/private HTTP headers and the correct handling of them.

How can content owners make sure that a piece of content doesn't get cached by Hola?

Easy: They can use HTTP's standard 'Cache-Control: private,no-store' in requests/responses, and Hola will not cache this information.

Can I use Hola with my Antivirus?

Hola should work with most popular Antivirus programs, and we are adding more support almost daily. However, we do have known issues we are working on, and send us an email at help@hola.org if you are experiencing any problems, and we'll try to get it fixed quickly for you.

Some Antivirus programs need Program Exceptions added in order for Hola to install and work.
Here's how:

My antivirus software is marking some files related to Hola as unsafe, are they?

This is a false positive report. The file it's catching is part of the Hola smart cache (you can mark it as safe, don't delete). We are working with the top antivirus vendors to get Hola completely whitelisted, so that these types of false positives don't disturb our users.

How can I disable Hola in incognito mode in Chrome?

Due to the permissions that Hola requires to operate (chrome.proxy permission), Chrome does not allow 'disabling' Hola from the incognito window. To disable Hola while in incognito, click the Hola extension icon, and turn it to 'off' mode, and turn it on again when you leave the incognito mode.

MISC.

Is Hola "Open source"?

At the moment we do not have plans to open source the product as a whole, but we do have portions of Hola that accelerate open source projects submitted to them, including: jemalloc (the FireFox mallocer), tcmalloc (Google Chrome's mallocer), Cygwin, sqlite, openssl and other projects.

If I use OpenDNS, does Hola interfere with it?

It might because Hola also implements a patented DNS resolution algorithm and it may/may not use OpenDNS on your computer, depending on various parameters of the configuration of your computer. So the short answer is: try it out and if it works for you - good. If not - send us an email, and we will check if we can help.

Can I use Hola together with another VPN service?

Using two VPN services at once can cause un-expected behavior. If you'd like to use two VPN services, simply quit Hola while using the other VPN service, and when you want to use Hola again close the other VPN service.

When I'm using Hola do I still need to register as a user or pay the website I'm watching?

Yes. You still need to register and pay for sites that require this, even when using Hola. Also, you must always comply with the site's terms of use.

Can I run Hola on a virtual machine? Can I run it on both the host and guest systems simultaneously?

Yes, Hola works on Windows, even if running under VMWare. Our browser extensions work on all operating systems that support Chrome and Firefox (except mobile). However, you should close the Hola client on the host system before you open the virtual machine, and never try to run Hola on both the host and guest operating systems at once.

Can I use Hola in my modem?

Not right now. At this point Hola only supports Windows, Android, or other platforms through the Chrome or Firefox extensions.

How can I remain updated as to the latest improvements and new product features?

We maintain a list of the major improvements, bug fixes and new features at hola.org/changelog. We post the important ones also on our Facebook and Twitter. For latest updates on our service and news Follow us on Twitter or Like us on Facebook