Using proxy servers in residential areas can breathe new life into your web scraping or bot software. Unlike IPs from a data center, these addresses come from actual devices, making it easier to blend in.
If you were looking for a place to buy residential proxies, you’ve found it. After reading this article, you will better understand which proxy service providers are worth investing in. Don’t worry; we’ve tested them all and outlined their key features so you can make a well-informed choice.
Don’t have time to scroll down the entire list of Best Residential Proxies? Here are my top 3 picks for ensuring superior performance and dependability.
- Oxylabs (#1 Pick)
- Smartproxy
- Bright Data
Providers | Proxy Pool million IPs |
Supported Protocol | City Level Targeting |
Oxylabs | 100 | HTTPS | ✅ |
Smartproxy | 40 | HTTP | ✅ |
Bright Data | 72 | HTTP/S, SOCKS5 | ✅ |
SOAX | 5 | HTTPS, SOCKS5 | ✅ |
Webshare | 30 | HTTP/SOCKS5 | ✅ |
GEOSurf | 3.7 | SOCKS/HTTPS | ✅ |
IPRoyal | 2 | HTTP/S, SOCKS4/5 | ✅ |
What are Residential Proxies?
Let’s start by covering some groundwork. A residential proxy is an IP address an ISP assigns to a single user or household. In contrast to proxy service providers from data centers, residential proxies come from actual user devices.
You can hide that your queries are coming from a datacenter or commercial server by using a proxy service that routes your traffic through residential IP addresses.
Using a residential proxy, you can pretend to live in a real neighborhood while hiding behind a fake IP. It’s the equivalent of temporarily relocating to a new residence in a different city.
7 Best Residential Proxies 2024
1) Oxylabs (Best Premium Residential Proxy Provider)
The largest proxy pool, which has access to 100 million IP addresses each month, is managed by Oxylabs. Using an area code or postal code, you can focus only on particular regions, and this method is international.
The performance of proxies is unmatched, and they are scalable and trustworthy. Numerous rotation customization options, an easy-to-use proxy management dashboard, a personal account manager, and suggestions on improving your scraping success are available.
Given its expensive cost, Oxylabs might not be the most excellent option for newcomers or lone users.
Features:
- 100 million residential IPs
- Support SOCKS5, HTTP(S)
- Cover 195 Location with country, cities, ZIP code targeting
- every request rotation, up to 30 minutes of sticky sessions
- 24/7 via live chat support
Pricing: Starts from $300/mo, with Pay as you option
Free Trial: Yes, 7-day free trial for businesses
✔️PROS
- A huge proxy pool
- Excellent uptime
- Scraping technologies for the web that are intelligent
- A comprehensive selection of features and products
❌CONS
- Above average prices
- No direct phone support
Read the Oxylabs review for more information.
2) Smartproxy (Best Value for Money)
Smartproxy is an excellent resource for individuals in need of back-connect residential proxies. You can target any city or state worldwide with its 195-nation coverage and 40 million Proxies under its total control.
The service finds a difficult-to-find balance between low cost, good performance, and extensive functionality with the interface. Manuals, proxy control tools, and exemplary customer service are all available.
Smartproxy requires minimal user interaction before users can use it because it focuses on self-service.
The single significant disadvantage is that carrier or ASN targeting is not possible with Smartproxy.
Features:
- 40 Million residential Ios
- Support SOCKS5, HTTP(S)
- Rotation request every 10, 30 minutes
- 195+ with country, state, & city targeting
- 24/7 support via chat or email
Pricing: Starts from $80/Mo with Pay as go option
Free Trial: No, but a 14-day money-back guarantee
✔️PROS
- Useful browser extensions and apps
- Giant proxy pool
- affordable proxy
- fast and unlimited connections
- pain-free set-up
❌CONS
- Response times are slow
- Complex pricing Plan
Read the Smartproxy review for more information.
3) BrightData
BrightData is thought to have one of the largest proxy networks. It provides a variety of options for data collection, such as proxy services, among others.
It provides statistics on a range of topics, such as e-commerce and real estate, as well as a browsing plugin for users who are not developers.
BrightData’s residential proxy service has a high success rate and an average response time of less than one second. Users must use ID cards to authenticate their identity. It is designed for large businesses.
Features:
- 72 Mn monthly IPs
- Supporting HTTP and HTTPS protocols
- 95 Country, City, & ZIP code targeting
- Every request with sticky sessions
- 24/7 via live chat
- 3rd Party Software Integration
Pricing: Starts from $500/Mo
Free Trial: 7-day free trial for businesses
✔️PROS
- Dedicated customer support.
- A fast-speed, reliable network
- Powerful setup & management tools
- Easy to set up.
❌CONS
- complicated Setup for new user
- More expensive than many
For more information, check out my detailed Bright Data Review.
4) SOAX
An estimated 5 million residential proxies are managed by SOAX. It provides a middle ground between inexpensive and free services, much like Smartproxy. Due to its capacity to rotate and target particular areas, SOAX is exceptional.
Both offer great flexibility, letting you switch IP addresses with each connection request, set a strict time restriction, or use the same IP address until it is unavailable. SOAX enables you to target the city, region, and even autonomous system number (ASN) without increasing your bill.
Technical choices like SOCKS5-based HTTP(S) traffic, required IP whitelisting, and constrained ports for plans present questions. This service provider is ideal for you if flexibility is crucial to you.
Features:
- 5M+ residential IPs
- Rotation Technology Available
- City-level targeting
- 1.19 sec response time
Pricing: $99/month – $700/month
Free Trial: 3-day free trial
5) Webshare
Webshare, an up-and-coming service provider, has expanded its capabilities to include Residential Proxies. It comes with a monthly pool of 30 million IP addresses that may be individually filtered by 195 regions.
Two of the company’s most decisive selling factors are its self-service model and flexibility. You can set the bandwidth cap yourself or add network priority for a more reliable connection (this function prioritizes your request above those of other users).
Your proxies will be rotated in and out with every request you make.
Webshare is one of the cheaper residential proxy services available. However, the service doesn’t allow for unique rotation and only provides a few targeting options.
Features:
- 30 million Residential IPs
- Supporting SOCKS5 and HTTP protocols
- 195, country targeting
- Rotation for every request
- Support on Weekdays
- IP authorization prevents residential service misuse by restricting IP addresses.
Pricing: Starts from $7 for 1 GB.
Free Trial: No free trial
6) GEOSurf
The GEOSurf product line also includes a Virtual Private Network (VPN), a scraping API, a proxy toolbar browser plugin, along with residential, ISP, and datacenter proxies. These products are not intended for individual consumers; they are made with big businesses in mind.
Its prices and plans, which start at $300 per month, obviously reflect the choice. The $800 monthly cost of the suggested plan makes it unaffordable for sole proprietors, small and medium-sized businesses, and even large businesses.
Features:
- 130+ countries, city targeting.
- Support HTTP & HTTPS.
- Ad-fraud protection.
Pricing: Starts at $300/month
Free trial: No free trial.
7) IPRoyal
IPRoyal offers lower prices and proxies that are never timed. A terabyte of data costs $3.15, whereas smaller data amounts cost multiple times as much per gigabyte.
Filtering and rotation settings can be adjusted as needed, and there is quick response time and SOCKS5 support. Proxies are inefficient, yet they can still perform essential functions.
The small size of IPRoyal’s proxy pool is its main drawback. It’s more compact than the majority of similar services. There is a correlation between proxy cost and resale value. This makes it unfit for widespread use or for IP address dependability.
Features:
- 195+ countries
- Country, state, & city-specific targeting
- Rotating & sticky sessions both
- SOCKS5 supported
- Proxy rotation every 1, 10, & 30 mins
Pricing: $7 GB
Free trial: No free trial.
Why are residential proxies important?
The actual question is, Why do we need residential proxies? Here are several important reasons:
Social media: Residential proxies can assist social media managers and marketers in managing various accounts & reaching regional audiences. Content & interaction methods can be tailored to local audiences utilizing proxies with IP addresses from specific areas.
Access restricted content: Certain websites, platforms & services have geographical limits. A residential proxy with a desired IP address can evade these limitations and let you access content or services unavailable in your area.
Web scraping: Residential proxies are used for web scraping & data collection. They allow data extraction from websites without detection or blocking. Rotating residential IP addresses simulates user behavior without triggering anti-scraping techniques.
Privacy & Anonymity: Residential proxies hide your IP address, protecting your online privacy. A residential proxy service makes your internet activity appear from a residential user, increasing anonymity and lowering tracking.
Residential Proxies Vs. Other (Type) Proxy Services
You want true browsing anonymity. VPNs and datacenter addresses mask your use, not your use. Residential Proxies make browsing appear human.
You will require widespread coverage. Residential Internet Protocol addresses are used by millions of people all over the world. Therefore, they serve more locations than a conventional data center. This makes them suitable for software localization, advertisement verification & search engine optimization crawling.
Your target’s defenses are robust. Travel fare, Sneakers, & other bot-traffic sites use IP reputation as their first defense. Consumer internet service providers register residential IPs, which improves their image.
Conclusion: Best Residential Proxies
Online, you can find a wide variety of residential proxy service providers. They’re all trying to do the same thing, but their methods and pricing differ. This post saves you the trouble of trying several solutions until you find one that works.
The best residential proxy for web scraping is Smartproxy and Oxylabs due to their affordable premium proxies and comprehensive anti-blocking features, respectively. With only one API call, you may use built-in anti-bot bypass, rotating proxies, and headless browser functionality.
FAQs
❓Are residential proxies legal?
As long as site scraping or market research is the intended objective, the usage of residential proxies is entirely within the law. Often, fraudsters misuse residential proxies for fraud, spam, and phishing activities, which can have major legal ramifications.
❓Can residential proxies be traced?
It prevents the target website from seeing the user’s true IP address, making it more difficult to track down the source of the requests. In contrast to proxies generated in a data center, which are generated in large batches and can be easily spotted as coming from an untrusted source, residential proxies are generated one at a time.
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