Onion service
You, guard, middle, your rendezvous, service rendezvous, service middle, service guard, service <-> service guard, service middle, service rendezvous, your rendezvous, your middle, your guard, you.
All those hops add latency because of having to traverse anywhere between three and six different networks over the internet.
Because to go to a clearnet website through the tor network, you have three hops. And to go to a hidden service, you have six hops.
Clearnet: You, guard middle, exit, website <-> website, exit, middle, guard, you
Onion service You, guard, middle, your rendezvous, service rendezvous, service middle, service guard, service <-> service guard, service middle, service rendezvous, your rendezvous, your middle, your guard, you.
All those hops add latency because of having to traverse anywhere between three and six different networks over the internet.
And clearnet use is very difficult through Tor. Exit node ips are flagged and you have impossible captchas on many sites.
That’s the problem with using a VPN ‘everywhere’ as some people say. I quickly became sick of being captchaed to death, so only for torrenting now.
Very true