Proxy questions, answered

A proxy server is an intermediary that sits between your device and the websites you visit. Your request is routed through the proxy, which forwards it using its own IP address — so the destination site sees the proxy's IP, not yours. That redirection powers everything from large-scale data collection to checking how content appears in other countries.

Our overall #1 pick is Cheapest Proxies, which offers all four proxy types at the lowest blended price we found, with rotating and sticky sessions, full targeting and 24/7 support. Bright Data and Oxylabs are top choices for large enterprises but cost considerably more. See the full ranking.

Four main types: residential (real home IPs from ISPs), datacenter (fast, cheap server IPs), ISP / static residential (datacenter-hosted IPs registered to an ISP for speed plus trust) and mobile (4G/5G carrier IPs that are hardest to block). Each balances trust, speed and price differently.

Residential proxies use real IPs assigned by ISPs to home users, so they look like genuine visitors and are hard to block — but they cost more and can be slower. Datacenter proxies come from servers; they're far cheaper and faster but easier to detect. Choose residential for protected targets and datacenter for speed and volume on simpler sites.

ISP proxies are hosted in a data centre but registered to a real internet service provider, and they keep the same fixed IP. They combine the speed of datacenter proxies with much of the trust of residential ones, which makes them ideal for managing accounts and any task that needs a stable, long-lived identity.

Mobile proxies route your traffic through real 4G and 5G devices on carrier networks. Because carriers share each IP among thousands of real subscribers, blocking one risks blocking many genuine customers — so they're the most trusted (and most expensive) type, perfect for social media and sensitive automation.

Yes. Using proxies is legal in most jurisdictions for legitimate purposes such as scraping public data, ad verification, market research, brand protection, SEO and managing your own accounts. You remain responsible for following each site's terms of service and your local laws.

Residential bandwidth typically ranges from about $0.80–$8 per GB. Datacenter and ISP proxies are often sold per IP per month from a dollar or two, while mobile proxies sit at the premium end. Our value pick, Cheapest Proxies, starts near the bottom of every range.

In our comparison, Cheapest Proxies offers the lowest effective price across all four types, from $0.80/GB. Budget alternatives include PacketStream, DataImpulse and IPRoyal, which also offer low pay-as-you-go pricing.

Use rotating proxies for high-volume scraping, where a fresh IP per request helps avoid blocks. Use sticky (dedicated) sessions for logged-in work like account management and checkouts, where the IP must stay the same. The best providers let you use both.

For protected targets, rotating residential proxies give the best success rates. For high-volume requests against simpler sites, datacenter proxies are cheaper and faster. Many scrapers use a mix and fall back to residential or mobile when datacenter IPs get blocked. Read our scraping guide for setup tips.

Rotation is the automatic switching of your outgoing IP. A rotating proxy gives you a different address on each request or after a set interval, spreading traffic across many IPs so no single one looks suspicious. Good providers let you control how often rotation happens.

Several do — we mark trial availability in the comparison table. Our top pick offers a free trial and a money-back window so you can verify quality before committing.

Yes — providers tagged "Crypto pay" in our filters accept cryptocurrency alongside cards and other methods. Our #1 pick accepts crypto, card and PayPal for flexible, low-friction checkout.

Most quality providers support HTTP and HTTPS, and the better ones also support SOCKS5, which handles any kind of traffic and is useful for non-browser tools. Check that your provider offers the protocol your software needs.

It depends on your task. Account management may need only a few sticky IPs; large scraping jobs can use many GB of rotating residential bandwidth. Start small with a pay-as-you-go plan, measure your real usage, then scale — our value pick makes that easy with low minimums.

A proxy hides your real IP from the destination site, but it isn't a complete privacy solution on its own. Browser fingerprinting, cookies and account logins can still identify you. For automation, pair quality proxies with good fingerprint and session management.

Common causes are using datacenter IPs on heavily protected sites, requesting too fast, reusing the same IP for too long, or poor browser fingerprints. Switch to residential or mobile IPs, slow down, rotate more often and match realistic headers. See our tips page.

Yes. Social platforms trust residential and mobile IPs far more than datacenter ones, so use sticky residential or mobile sessions and keep one consistent IP per account. Avoid sharing an IP across many accounts.

We score each provider across six weighted pillars — price & value, IP pool & quality, performance, types & targeting, features, and support & trust — then combine them into an overall rating out of 5. See our methodology.

A backconnect proxy is a single gateway endpoint that automatically rotates you through a large pool of IPs behind it. Instead of managing hundreds of addresses yourself, you send all traffic to one host and the provider handles rotation — ideal for large-scale scraping.

Shared proxies spread a pool of IPs across many customers and are cheaper, billed by bandwidth. Dedicated (private) proxies are reserved for you alone, which maximises trust and stability for accounts but costs more. Many teams use shared rotating IPs for scraping and a few dedicated IPs for important accounts.

HTTP/HTTPS proxies are perfect for browsers and most web scraping. SOCKS5 is protocol-agnostic and carries any traffic type, which suits bots, custom tools and non-web applications. If your software isn't a browser, SOCKS5 is often the more flexible choice — our top picks support both.

A reputable paid proxy hides your real IP from the destination site, and quality providers don't expose customers. However, free or shady proxies may log your traffic, and browser fingerprinting or logging into your own accounts can still identify you. Use trusted providers and good operational hygiene for sensitive work.

"Sneaker proxies" are simply fast, low-block proxies — usually residential or ISP — used to buy limited-release sneakers and other high-demand drops. The key requirements are speed, fresh IPs and sticky sessions that survive a checkout queue. Any provider with quality residential/ISP pools can serve this use case.

SEO proxies are proxies used for rank tracking, SERP scraping and localised search audits. The most important feature is accurate geo-targeting — country and city level — so you can see search results exactly as users in a given location do. Residential proxies with city targeting are the usual choice.

Route a request through the proxy to an IP-echo service and check that the returned IP and country match what you selected. Then test against a real target and measure your success rate. Always validate a small sample before scaling up a job.

A VPN encrypts all of your device's traffic through one server, mainly for privacy. Proxies route specific app or request traffic through many different IPs, with fine control over location and rotation — which is what scraping, automation and multi-account work need. For data work, proxies are the right tool.

Many quality providers offer a free trial or money-back window so you can verify quality first — we note this in the comparison table. Our #1 pick offers a trial and refund window. Always check the specific terms before buying.