The age-verification train keeps on chugging, and with it comes even more state-level bans on Pornhub. Missouri is the latest US state to impose age-verification requirements, which prompted sites owned by Pornhub parent company Aylo (including YouPorn and Redtube) to go dark. It joins 22 other states where Aylo sites are inaccessible without a VPN (more on that later).
Overseas, Pornhub is also blocked in France, where lawmakers required porn sites to adopt an independent age-verification system. That came after the European Union opened formal age-verifications investigations into Pornhub, Stripchat, XNXX, and XVideos after a preliminary investigation found that the four sites were not complying with two elements of the region’s Digital Services Act (DSA).
Aylo backs device-based age verification, which would put the onus on companies like Apple, Google, and Microsoft to check people’s ages versus specific porn sites.
“We firmly believe age verification can make the internet a safer space for everyone, when it is done right,” Aylo says. “Unfortunately, the way these new laws are executed by lawmakers is ineffective and puts users’ privacy at risk. Those seeking adult content will inevitably end up on irresponsible sites that don’t enforce safety, privacy, consent, or content moderation.”
In the UK, Aylo promised to roll out “methods recognized by regulators as being capable of highly effective age assurance” to comply with the Online Safety Act (OSA). However, it reiterated that “effectiveness has been alarmingly limited, leaving the UK’s children, as well as sensitive user information, at risk. It is characteristically impossible to enforce these regulations at scale in the digital space.”
According to Pornhub’s 2025 Year in Review, the US still generates the most site visits, followed by Mexico and the Philippines. France is No. 6, and the UK is at No. 8. Pornhub notes that “France is often one of our top 3 countries for traffic,” but the blockade changed that, so this year’s stats for the country only include traffic data from the first half of the year. Pornhub didn’t break out overall traffic, but Semrush says it got 4 billion visits globally in October.
Which US States Are Blocked From Viewing Pornhub?
In the US, Aylo has blocked Pornhub and its other sites in the following states in protest of its age-verification laws:
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Alabama
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Arizona
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Arkansas
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Florida
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Georgia
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Idaho
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Indiana
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Kansas
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Kentucky
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Mississippi
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Missouri
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Montana
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Nebraska
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North Carolina
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North Dakota
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Oklahoma
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South Carolina
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South Dakota
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Tennessee
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Texas
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Utah
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Virginia
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Wyoming
So far, six states have passed age-verification bills this year: Arizona, Ohio, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.
Pornhub is not blocked in Ohio because the law doesn’t apply to providers of interactive computer services, which Aylo says covers its sites, Mashable reports.
According to the Free Speech Coalition, another eight states have pending age-verification bills—Hawaii, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin—as well as Washington, D.C. Age-verification bills have failed in Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, and West Virginia.
How Did This Start in the US?
The age-verification battle in the US dates back to 2023 when Louisiana passed an age-verification bill. At the time, Pornhub complied with the law and saw its traffic drop by approximately 80% in the state.
“But we know that people didn’t stop consuming porn overnight because of this new law,” Pornhub says. “They just very easily moved to pirate, illegal, or other non-compliant sites that don’t ask visitors to verify their age.”
Pornhub argues that it has “robust Trust and Safety measures…to protect both the users viewing content on Pornhub from engaging with potentially dangerous content and provide a safe platform for creators to monetize their content and engage with fans.
“Therefore, these laws have not only failed at protecting minors, but have introduced further harm by displacing traffic to sites with few or zero Trust and Safety measures,” it says.
So, as more states moved to pass age-verification laws, Pornhub opted to block access in those states, starting with Utah in 2023.
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If you visit Pornhub in a state where the site is blocked, you’re met with a message that argues the state’s law is “ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous,” like this one shared by CBS Austin political reporter Michael Adkison after the Texas block went into effect.
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States argue that they’re trying to protect children. “If a billion-dollar corporation would rather leave Missouri than verify that children are not accessing graphic sexual content, that tells you everything you need to know about its priorities,” Missouri Attorney General Hanaway said in a statement. “We are proud to stand on the side of parents, families, and basic decency. Missouri will not apologize for protecting children.”
What Do These State Laws Do?
The laws are very similar, but here’s a sampling of what they require.
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In Alabama, access to Pornhub was blocked ahead of an age-verification law that went into effect on Oct. 1, 2024, AL.com reports. Under HB164, adult sites must use “reasonable age verification methods” to confirm that people are over the age of 18 and display warnings about porn being “potentially biologically addictive” and harmful to “human brain development.”
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In Florida, HB 3 requires adult sites to verify that visitors are 18 “using either an anonymous or standard age verification method.” Anonymous ones “must be conducted by a nongovernmental, independent third party.” Florida’s attorney general can collect civil penalties of up to $50,000 per violation, reasonable attorney fees, and court costs, while minors can also pursue up to $10,000 in damages.
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In Indiana, SB17 went into effect on June 27, 2024, and requires sites that offer adult content to “use a reasonable age verification method to prevent a minor from accessing an adult-oriented website.” Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita says, “Children shouldn’t be able to easily access explicit material that can cause them harm. It’s common sense. We need to protect and shield them from the psychological and emotional consequences associated with viewing porn. We look forward to upholding our constitutional duty to defend this law in court.”
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In Kentucky, House Bill 278 applies to sites where more than one-third of their content would be considered harmful to minors.
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In Missouri, AG Hanaway used the state’s Merchandising Practices Act to impose a new age-verification rule that requires platforms that host sexually explicit content to prevent minors from accessing them via age checks that use government IDs or another reasonable method. Failure to implement these safeguards will result in penalties up to $10,000 per day.
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In Montana, SB 544 requires sites to verify age by having people provide “a digitized identification card” or access a “commercial age verification system” that checks a government ID or uses some other sort of “commercially reasonable method” to verify someone’s age.
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In North Carolina, House Bill 8 was part of a larger education bill that also covered things like adding a computer science requirement for high school graduation. But it also imposed the age-verification check for adult sites. It requires sites to use “a commercially available database that is regularly used by businesses or governmental entities for the purpose of age and identity verification or…another commercially reasonable method.” Sites that fail to comply could face civil action from the parents of kids who viewed pornography or anyone whose data is unlawfully retained. In signing the bill in 2023, former Gov. Roy Cooper said those age checks are “important…to help protect children from online pornography.”
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In Tennessee, the Protect Tennessee Minors Act requires sites to verify IDs once an hour via uploaded IDs and retain seven years of anonymized data on users who access the site, The Tennessean reports. (South Carolina’s Child Online Safety Act (H. 3424) has similar requirements.)
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In Texas, HB 1181 requires adult sites to verify that visitors are of age. It was set to go into effect in September 2023, but Pornhub sued and secured an early victory. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton appealed and got a temporary reprieve in March 2024, allowing the state to enforce HB 1181.
Taking It to the Courts
The Free Speech Coalition and a group of adult platforms, including Aylo, have sued over laws in Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Montana, Tennessee, Texas, and Utah. The Utah case was dismissed last year. The Texas case, meanwhile, made its way to the US Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of Texas in late June, which put a damper on the other cases; the Florida case was dropped over the summer.
How to Access Pornhub in States Where It’s Blocked
The Pornhub website as it appears in Utah. (Credit: Pornhub)
When Pornhub was blocked in Utah, we turned to VPN services and connected to servers in Virginia and Utah. Upon navigating to Pornhub, we were greeted by the blockade message.
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If you’re affected by the ban, use the VPN app of your choice to connect to a server not in a location currently blocked by Pornhub. (Note that while this guidance can be used to get around Pornhub’s embargo, it could also be used to avoid the very age-restriction requirements Pornhub is protesting. We can’t advise you on the risks of trying to circumvent the law.)
When you switch on a VPN, your web traffic is routed through an encrypted connection to a server operated by the VPN company. That server could be in a different state or a different country from you. Because your web traffic exits that server, it appears as if you are browsing the web from wherever the server is.
So, if you’re in Utah, you should connect to a VPN server that’s not located in Utah, and then navigate to Pornhub as usual. We recommend that you also use incognito mode while streaming pornography to prevent the URLs from showing up in your browser’s history and autocomplete options.
If you don’t already have a VPN service installed, you can find one that will suit you in our roundup of the best VPNs for Pornhub.
Which VPN Should You Use?
Nearly all VPN services will let you specify the country where you want your traffic to appear. Some will let you pick down to the city level. A few let you see a list of the actual servers themselves, and their locations, and make your choice that way.
US-based Pornhub viewers will probably want to use a VPN server that’s located in the US. We recommend a VPN that will at least let you choose servers in a specific US state. Do note that latency will increase and browsing speed decrease when using a VPN, and that the impact will be more noticeable the further away the VPN server is from you.
PCMag’s top-rated VPN Editors’ Choice winner, Proton VPN, shows the cities and specific servers available to customers. It also offers an excellent free VPN, but your server choice will be far more limited—there are servers in the US, but you can’t specify which to use. Fortunately, the free version has no time or data limit.
Other Editors’ Choice-winning VPNs that let you select cities include IVPN, Mullvad VPN, NordVPN, and TunnelBear VPN. Note that IVPN and Mullvad VPN use a privacy-protecting account number system that requires very little personal information, and both will accept cash sent to their respective HQs for a nearly anonymous experience.
How to Watch Porn Online Safely
Max Eddy contributed to this story.
About Our Expert
Chloe Albanesius
Executive Editor, News
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I started out covering tech policy in DC for The National Journal, where my beat included state-level tech news and all the congressional hearings and FCC meetings I could handle. I later covered Wall Street trading tech before switching gears to consumer tech. I now lead PCMag’s news coverage and manage our how-to content.
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