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Windows

Access Server supports VPN connections from Windows devices using a VPN client app. Our app, OpenVPN Connect, is available for Windows, and makes it easy to do that.

Each Windows device needs a client application to connect with Access Server. We recommend using OpenVPN Connect.

Introduction

This topic is meant for Access Server users who wish to connect their Windows computers using the official OpenVPN Connect app.

OpenVPN Connect is our free VPN client app. You can download it from Access Server's Client Web UI with bundled connection profiles ready to connect to your VPN server. Here, you'll find an overview of connecting to Access Server from Windows and a tutorial you can follow.

OpenVPN Connect

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Tutorial: Install OpenVPN Connect

Click on the tutorial below to install OpenVPN Connect from the Client Web UI:

OpenVPN Connect on Windows

The OpenVPN protocol isn't built into Windows. Therefore, you must install a client app to communicate with Access Server. A client app captures the traffic you want to send through the OpenVPN tunnel, encrypts it, passes it to the server, and decrypts the return traffic.

We recommend downloading OpenVPN Connect directly from your Access Server Client Web UI. You can also download the installation file for OpenVPN Connect v3 from the link below:

Open-source OpenVPN GUI

The open-source project also has a Windows client called OpenVPN GUI. This client supports connecting to multiple OpenVPN servers simultaneously, but doing so requires careful configuration to avoid conflicting routes and subnets.

You can import a profile from Access Server using the import option from OpenVPN GUI.

You can save OpenVPN connection profiles into the program’s config directory, usually located at C:\program files (x86)\openvpn\config\ with .conf or .ovpn file extensions. For example, you can download a user-locked or auto-login profile from the OpenVPN Access Server web interface and place it in this directory. The system tray menu displays the options to use with this connection profile.

You can download OpenVPN GUI from the community downloads section on our site and download the installer for Windows. The OpenVPN GUI program comes included with this installer.

Helpful Resources