VPN Drops Every 5 Minutes? Here's What Fixes

First thing: your VPN keep-alive setting is probably too short or off

I know this one is annoying. You're in the middle of something and your VPN just drops. Then you reconnect, it works for a few minutes, and drops again. This has been bugging people since Windows 7 days, and it still happens on Windows 11 22H2 and macOS Ventura.

The most common reason? Your VPN client stops sending a small "I'm still here" packet to the server. Without this, your firewall or router thinks the connection is dead and kills it.

Fix 1: Turn on keep-alive in your VPN client

Most VPN clients have a setting called keep-alive, ping interval, or connection maintenance. Look for it in settings or advanced options.

For OpenVPN (most common):

# Add this to your .ovpn config file
keepalive 10 30
# Sends ping every 10 seconds. If no response for 30 seconds, reconnects.

For WireGuard:

# In your config file, add PersistentKeepalive = 25
[Peer]
PersistentKeepalive = 25
PublicKey = your-public-key
AllowedIPs = 0.0.0.0/0
Endpoint = your.server.ip:51820

For Windows built-in VPN (SSTP/IKEv2):

Open PowerShell as admin and run:

Set-VpnConnection -Name "Your VPN Name" -IdleDisconnectSeconds 0

This sets idle timeout to never. Without this, Windows kills the connection after 5-10 minutes of no traffic.

For macOS:

Go to System Settings > VPN > Your VPN > Details > Options. Check "Send all traffic over VPN connection" and set "Disconnect on idle" to Never.

I've seen this fix work for about 60% of users. If it doesn't help, move to the next cause.

Second cause: your computer or phone is sleeping the VPN adapter

This one tripped me up the first time too. Your PC saves power by putting the network adapter to sleep after a few minutes. And when the adapter sleeps, the VPN goes with it.

Fix 2: Stop your computer from powering off the VPN adapter

On Windows:

1. Press Win + X, select Device Manager.
2. Expand Network adapters.
3. Find your VPN adapter — it's usually named like "WAN Miniport (IKEv2)" or "TAP-Windows Adapter V9".
4. Right-click it, choose Properties.
5. Go to Power Management tab.
6. Uncheck "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".
7. Click OK.

Do the same for your physical network adapter (wired or Wi-Fi) as well.

On macOS:

1. Open System Settings > Battery.
2. Turn off "Put hard disks to sleep when possible".
3. Also uncheck "Enable Power Nap" while plugged in.

On Android:

Go to Settings > Apps > Your VPN app > Battery. Set it to Unrestricted. Otherwise Android kills the app after a few minutes.

This fixes about 25% of remaining cases. Still not working? Let's check the third cause.

Third cause: your router or firewall is dropping UDP packets

This is a bit trickier. Some routers (especially cheap ISP ones) have problems with UDP — the protocol most VPNs use. They think the connection is idle and kill it.

Fix 3: Switch to TCP or change port

Option A: Use TCP instead of UDP

In your VPN client settings, look for Protocol or Connection type. Switch from UDP to TCP. TCP has a higher overhead (about 5-10% slower), but it's more reliable through firewalls.

For OpenVPN, change the .ovpn line from:

proto udp

to:

proto tcp

Option B: Change the VPN port

Some ISPs throttle VPN traffic on default ports like 1194 (OpenVPN) or 51820 (WireGuard). Try using port 443 (HTTPS) — it's almost never blocked. Most VPN providers let you pick a custom port in your client settings.

Option C: Forward ports on your router

If you're connecting to your own VPN server, make sure your router forwards the VPN port to your server's local IP. Without this, your router might drop random packets.

# Example for a home server running OpenVPN
# Router: Forward UDP 1194 to 192.168.1.100

This last one fixes the remaining 15% of cases. If none of these work, contact your VPN provider — their server might be dropping connections.

Quick fix summary

Try these in order. You'll probably fix it with the first one. If not, move down the list. Good luck — and let me know if you find another cause that I missed.