Do you use both together? or one or the other? I’m deciding if I should continue paying for it.
They do two different things. A VPN shields your online activity but doesn’t filter websites. DNS filtering blocks access to malicious sites based on your lists etc.
It literally has nothing to do with it. A DNS will essentially translate an IP into a domain name and vice versa to facilitate human navigation on the web (it can therefore also protect you from malicious sites in this sense since you can use lists of known malicious sites so that your DNS service blocks them upstream). A VPN will essentially transport your connection as if you were elsewhere (another country for example) and what passes through this “tunnel” will be encrypted. Your IP address will be that of the VPN tunnel and not that of your home (as usual) for the sites you visit (but not for your service provider, who will know that you are using a VPN). These are therefore two different services which can be complementary if you wish. I explain this in a deliberately simple way. I hope this is clearer for you 
I run both NextDns and Mullvad. Works great
I use DoH NextDns with my vpn because I still want the blocking it provides. YMMV.
They are different things with different use cases. Your computer uses DNS for anything involving the internet. It is what translates IP addresses into human readable language and vice versa. A VPN allows you to spoof your IP address and appear to be in a location you are not. They are useful for privacy and getting around geoblocks. VPNs have their own DNS. Some will even let you use NextDNS.
Ugh, I blame VPN marketing teams for this question. Here’s my perspective:
A VPN primarily conceals your public IP address by tunnelling your connection through its own server and directs your DNS queries to its resolvers rather than those from your ISP or local DHCP. Since the majority of websites now use HTTPS, a VPN essentially masks your IP and DNS requests, offering only marginal privacy benefits. For instance, on a typical home broadband connection, your IP address often changes within a 24‑hour cycle unless you have a fixed one.
To illustrate:
• With a VPN: Your Public IP ⇔ VPN Server ⇔ Website
• Without a VPN: Your Public IP ⇔ Website
In essence, a VPN creates an encrypted tunnel between your device (or home network) and the VPN server. Beyond obscuring your IP address and DNS traffic from your ISP, it doesn’t significantly enhance your privacy - especially considering that HTTPS already encrypts the connection between your browser and the website. Moreover, it does nothing to prevent online profiling through cookies.
Conversely, NextDNS is a DNS service that not only resolves domain names but also applies filtering rules. It can block connections to known malware domains and privacy-invasive ad networks. Additionally, by encrypting DNS queries, NextDNS prevents your ISP from seeing the domains you’re accessing.
Some VPN providers do offer integrated DNS filtering, but in my view, VPNs are often overhyped as a comprehensive privacy solution when they are far from a security silver bullet.
VPNs do offer the ability to choose an IP from a specified country, sometimes enabling you to access geo restricted content, but lots of major streaming providers block VPN providers from streaming.
If you’re looking for the best balance of privacy and security use both a reputable VPN provider and DNS filtering service like NextDNS, but be aware of the drawbacks such as reduced bandwidth and restrictions imposed by streaming and content providers on known VPN networks.
I recommend Mobile4/5g or home broadband connections alongside NextDNS, for the best balance of performance and security. I’d only ever use a VPN if I absolutely had to join a WiFi network where no cell/mobile option was available.
NextDNS is the best $20 tech spend I’ve made in the past 25 years. I’ve been a paid client for over 4 years.
nextDNS and VPN do serve different purposes. So it depends on your usage case. I personally am using nextDNS together with IVPN
Those are 2 different things, meaning they can also be sued in combination with each other.
NextDns filters contents (ads, spyware mostly) from the websites, while a VPN is to “shield” your online activity and bypass firewalls.
Best way to do it is Mullvad vpn + nextdns. Connect by putting the ipv6 address of nextdns into the custom dns section of your Mullvad settings
I use both at the same time.
3rd party DNS provider - a little bit harder for ISPs to track you especially if encrypted, NextDNS on top of this offers filtering, diagnostics, performance adjustments.
VPN - encrypts everything going through it, not just DNS, So ISPs wont be able to track you, although the VPN provider could still track you. Running VPN on a server you manage rather than renting a VPN directly will reduce the risk of the latter.
Ah okay, thank you for letting me know. Do you know of any services that provide both? Or do you have any recommendations for a vpn service i can use alongside NextDNS?
It clears it up very well, thank you 
Which setup did you follow?
I’m looking into using that combo, and I already use Mullvad. I find that some websites block VPNs, so it seems like adding NextDNS to Mullvad settings could be problematic, as opposed to just setting my device to use NextDNS. On the other hand, if, for any reason, NextDNS is blocking a site I need to access, is there any way to disable it temporarily (rather than whitelisting the site)? Because if not, then Mullvad + NextDNS might be a better solution, as it can be switched off when needed.
They have their own blocklists, but unfortunately you can’t add custom lists.
Edit: To clarify, you can add your own black/white listed domains. But you can’t use lists such as OISD, Hagezi, etc.
You can use wireguard to use nextdns + a VPN like Cloudflare warp
nordvpn will let you use their dns servers or you can put your nextdns one in