In 2025, internet censorship in Russia, China, and Iran has reached an unprecedented level. Traditional VPN protocols like OpenVPN and even WireGuard are detected and blocked by Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) systems in seconds. Enter VLESS — a lightweight protocol that is becoming the last working solution for bypassing modern censorship.
This article explains how VLESS works on a technical level, why it is so effective at evading detection, and shares real-world experience of building a VPN service in Russia's hostile environment.
What is VLESS and Why It Matters
VLESS (Very Lightweight Encryption Security Stream) is a protocol developed by the V2Ray project as an evolution of VMess. Unlike traditional VPN protocols designed for privacy and speed, VLESS was initially engineered with one single goal in mind:complete invisibility to Deep Packet Inspection systems.
The key innovation is radical simplicity. While OpenVPN adds over 100 bytes of overhead to each packet, VLESS adds only 25-50 bytes. More importantly, these bytes contain no distinctive patterns that a DPI could recognize.
The Technical Reality: How Censorship Systems Work
To understand why VLESS succeeds where others fail, we need to look at how modern censorship actually works. Russia's TSPU (Technical Means of Countering Threats) system uses three primary detection methods.
Protocol Fingerprinting — the first line of defense. Every VPN protocol has a characteristic handshake. OpenVPN, for example, starts every connection with a recognizable pattern:
Opcode: P_CONTROL_HARD_RESET_CLIENT_V2 Session ID: [random 8 bytes] Packet ID: 0x00000001 Message packet-ID: [4 bytes]
Even if the payload is encrypted, the header structure is constant across all OpenVPN connections. DPI systems can detect this with near-perfect accuracy. WireGuard has a similar issue with its handshake initiation message, which always starts with a type field0x01, followed by the sender's index.
Statistical Traffic Analysis — the second method. Even if you can't read the content, you can analyze the patterns. WireGuard sends packets at predictable intervals and with constant sizes. Shadowsocks has a characteristic pattern of small control packets followed by large data packets. Machine learning models trained on these patterns can identify VPN traffic with 80-95% accuracy.
Active Probing — the most sophisticated technique. When a DPI system suspects a server might be a VPN, it actively connects to it and attempts a protocol handshake. If the server responds with VPN-specific behavior, it gets blacklisted. This is how most Shadowsocks and Trojan servers are eventually caught.
How VLESS Defeats All Three Detection Methods
The VLESS architecture is brilliantly simple. The entire protocol header looks like this:
[Version: 1 байт] = 0x00 [UUID: 16 байт] = идентификатор клиента [AddInfo Length: 1 байт] = длина дополнительной информации [AddInfo: переменная] = опциональные метаданные [Command: 1 байт] = 0x01 для TCP, 0x02 для UDP [Port: 2 байта] = порт назначения [AddrType: 1 байт] = 0x01 IPv4, 0x02 домен, 0x03 IPv6 [Address: переменная] = адрес назначения
That's it. No magic numbers, no distinctive opcodes, no protocol-specific fields. Just the bare minimum of information needed to route traffic. And critically, this header is never sent in the clear.
VLESS wraps everything in standard TLS 1.3. The actual connection establishment looks identical to accessing any HTTPS website:
Client → Server: ClientHello - TLS версия: 1.3 - Cipher suites: [стандартные браузерные шифры] - SNI: cloudflare.com (или любой легитимный домен) - ALPN: h2, http/1.1 Server → Client: ServerHello - Выбранный шифр: TLS_AES_128_GCM_SHA256 - Сертификат: [валидный Let's Encrypt сертификат] [TLS 1.3 зашифрованное рукопожатие завершается] [Application Data] ← VLESS протокол спрятан здесь
To a DPI system, this is indistinguishable from normal website browsing. There are no protocol signatures to detect. The statistical patterns match normal HTTPS traffic because itis normal HTTPS traffic, just with VPN data inside.
The Reality in Russia: October 2025, Mass Protocol Blocking
I've been managing VPN infrastructure in Russia since 2020, and October 2025 was a turning point. Here's what actually happened to each protocol.
OpenVPN fell first, years ago. The detection rate is now 100% within 30 seconds of connecting. DPI systems have been perfecting their fingerprinting for years.
WireGuard lasted longer thanks to modern cryptography, but statistical analysis caught up. By mid-2024, connections started being throttled to unusable speeds within minutes, then blocked entirely. Current detection rate: 100%.
Shadowsocks was the workhorse for years. The original implementation was blocked, then people added obfuscation plugins. They worked until September 2024, when Russia deployed updated DPI signatures. Now, even heavily obfuscated Shadowsocks is detected within hours. Detection rate: 95%.
Trojan was considered an "undetectable" protocol because it mimicked HTTPS well. It worked perfectly until August 2025, when active probing became widespread. The problem is that Trojan servers respond to invalid requests in a characteristic way. Once DPI systems started actively probing suspicious servers, Trojan's cover was blown. Detection rate: 90%.
VMess was the last hope before VLESS. It's the original V2Ray protocol with strong encryption and a TLS wrapper. It worked great until September 2025, when new DPI updates specifically targeted it. The problem is that VMess has a characteristic packet structure even within the TLS wrapper. The timing between packets and the size distribution gave it away. Detection rate: 80%.
VLESS — the only protocol still working reliably. I've been running VLESS servers since January 2025, and the survival rate is impressive. With the right configuration (TLS + WebSocket + CDN), the detection rate is less than 5%. Servers that would have been blocked in days with other protocols have been running for 10 months straight.
A Real VLESS Configuration for Production
Here is a production-grade VLESS server configuration that actually works in Russia:
{ "log": { "loglevel": "warning" }, "inbounds": [{ "port": 443, "protocol": "vless", "settings": { "clients": [{ "id": "a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-abcd-ef1234567890", "level": 0, "email": "user@example.com" }], "decryption": "none", "fallbacks": [{ "dest": 8080, "xver": 1 }] }, "streamSettings": { "network": "ws", "security": "tls", "wsSettings": { "path": "/api/v1/stream", "headers": { "Host": "example.com" } }, "tlsSettings": { "serverName": "example.com", "certificates": [{ "certificateFile": "/etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem", "keyFile": "/etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem" }], "minVersion": "1.3", "cipherSuites": [ "TLS_AES_128_GCM_SHA256", "TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384", "TLS_CHACHA20_POLY1305_SHA256" ], "alpn": ["h2", "http/1.1"] } } }], "outbounds": [{ "protocol": "freedom", "settings": {} }] }
The critical details here are the WebSocket path, which looks like a legitimate API endpoint, the fallback to port 8080 (where a real web server should be running), and the TLS 1.3 configuration that matches what modern browsers use.
Why CDN Integration is Mandatory
Running VLESS on a bare IP address is suicide. Even with perfect protocol masking, IP blocking will eventually get you. The solution is integration with a CDN, specifically Cloudflare.
The architecture looks like this:
Пользователь → Cloudflare CDN → Origin сервер (VLESS)
The user connects to Cloudflare's IP addresses, which are used by millions of legitimate websites. The DPI system sees HTTPS traffic to Cloudflare. Blocking it would mean breaking half the internet. Cloudflare then proxies the connection to your origin server, which can be anywhere in the world.
The configuration requires setting up Cloudflare's "orange cloud" and using the WebSocket transport. Here is the Nginx configuration that sits in front of V2Ray:
server { listen 8080; server_name example.com; location /api/v1/stream { proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:10000; proxy_http_version 1.1; proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade; proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade"; proxy_set_header Host $host; proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr; proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for; proxy_read_timeout 3600s; } location / { root /var/www/html; index index.html; } }
The fallback location serves a real website, so if someone visits your domain with a browser, they'll see legitimate content. Only requests to the specific WebSocket path are proxied to V2Ray.
My Journey: Building MegaV VPN in a Hostile Environment
I started building MegaV VPN in 2020, initially just for personal use. At that time, Shadowsocks worked fine. Then it stopped. I switched to Trojan — same story a few months later. Tried VMess — blocked in September.
Every time a protocol was blocked, I had to rebuild everything. Reconfigure servers, update clients, explain to users what happened. It was exhausting and unsustainable.
The breakthrough came when I realized the problem wasn't a specific protocol, but the reliance on a single protocol. The solution is protocol agnosticism with automatic failover.
The MegaV architecture supports multiple protocols simultaneously. The client first tries VLESS (because it works 98% of the time). If that fails, it automatically switches to VMess, then Shadowsocks, then Trojan. The user never sees the complexity; they just stay connected.
The implementation uses a simple health check system:
class ProtocolManager: def __init__(self): self.protocols = [ {'name': 'vless', 'priority': 1, 'status': 'unknown'}, {'name': 'vmess', 'priority': 2, 'status': 'unknown'}, {'name': 'shadowsocks', 'priority': 3, 'status': 'unknown'}, {'name': 'trojan', 'priority': 4, 'status': 'unknown'} ] def check_protocol(self, protocol: dict) -> bool: """Проверяет работает ли протокол""" try: result = self.test_connection(protocol['name'], timeout=5) protocol['status'] = 'working' if result else 'blocked' return result except Exception: protocol['status'] = 'blocked' return False def get_best_protocol(self) -> str: """Возвращает работающий протокол с наивысшим приоритетом""" for protocol in sorted(self.protocols, key=lambda x: x['priority']): if self.check_protocol(protocol): return protocol['name'] return 'emergency'
Every 5 minutes, the client checks all protocols and updates their status. If the current protocol fails, it instantly switches to the next working one. Users don't experience disconnects, just a brief pause.
Why VLESS Will Continue to Work
The fundamental reason for VLESS's success is that it doesn't try to be clever. It doesn't invent new encryption, use exotic protocols, or do anything distinctive. It simply wraps the minimum routing information in standard TLS.
To block VLESS, censors would have to block all TLS traffic, which would break the entire internet. Or they would have to decrypt TLS, which is computationally impossible at scale and would break trust in the entire internet infrastructure.
The only real vulnerability is IP blocking, which is why CDN integration is critical. As long as VLESS servers remain behind a shared CDN infrastructure, they are effectively unblockable.
Getting Free VLESS Servers for Testing
Before choosing a VPN service, it's worth testing VLESS yourself. There are several ways to get free servers for testing.
Public Lists of Free Servers — the easiest option. Many providers offer free public servers for testing. The catch is that these servers are used by thousands of users, so speeds can be low and they get blocked more often. But they are perfect for understanding how VLESS works.
MegaV maintains a constantly updated list of free V2Ray servers at megav.app/en/v2ray-servers. The page includes VLESS, VMess, Shadowsocks, and Trojan configs that can be copied with a single click. New servers are added daily as old ones get blocked.
The process is simple. Visit the free servers page, filter by protocol (choose VLESS for the best results), and copy the server configuration. Most V2Ray clients support importing configs directly from the clipboard.
Try Production-Ready VLESS
If you want to experience VLESS without the complexity of setup or the limitations of free servers, MegaV VPN offers a production-ready infrastructure optimized for Russia, China, and Iran. It features pre-configured VLESS with automatic protocol failover, CDN integration, and a zero-log policy.
The service includes free and premium plans. The free plan uses public servers similar to those in the free server list, but with automatic rotation when blocked. The premium plan provides dedicated servers with guaranteed bandwidth and priority support.
Visit megav.app to download, or check megav.app/en/v2ray-servers for free public servers.
Full disclosure: I am the developer of MegaV VPN. This article reflects 5 years of real-world experience fighting censorship, not theoretical knowledge. Every configuration shown here is running in production right now.
Technical Resources
Official V2Ray Documentation: https://www.v2ray.com/
VLESS Protocol Specification: https://github.com/v2fly/v2ray-core
Censorship Circumvention Research: https://censorbib.nymity.ch/
About the Author
I am a developer who started building VPN tools in 2020 after observing the escalation of internet censorship in Russia. What began as a personal project became MegaV VPN, now helping thousands of users in censored regions stay connected.
I have spent 5 years reverse-engineering DPI systems, testing every protocol under real censorship conditions, and building infrastructure that survives in hostile environments. This article shares the technical knowledge gained from that experience.
Contact: GitHub: https://github.com/Romaxa55/MegaV_Public | Website: https://megav.app | Email: support@megav.store