The easiest answer is just don’t connect to public WiFi. It is possible that WiFi operator or another user could intercept your data, either for nefarious hacking or maybe less nefarious to sell data to ad brokers. Likely your biggest risk is someone gathering enough information to take over your email account because then they can reset your other passwords. In the US at least, your phone plan probably has more than enough cellular data for routine internet use and can be tethered to your computer or iPad. State level actors can spoof cell towers to steal data, and there is evidence of this in Washington DC, but this would be unlikely at a random tourist spot in middle America. Some tiers of Netflix or Hulu let you download content to your device ahead of time so you don’t have to stream on the road.

VPN has different use cases—
1. You want to obscure your location. Maybe to watch a game not available in your market or other blocked content (ex western news in china)
2. You want to obscure your data from your service provider or the government. For example if you use a Swiss VPN it may be harder for law enforcement to subpoena.
3. You want a more secure data tunnel when using unsecured wifi.

Presuming your use case is #3, any of the big players are probably fine. But you can count on paying $10-$15 per month. Be wary of free services… there is no such thing as free. They are monetizing you in some way.

Great review, thats exactly what i was after. Thank you!