In this post, we will explore the versatility of SOCKS5 Proxies and discover which are the Best SOCKS5 Proxy Providers for your needs, whether you want to mask your IP address, stream geo-restricted movies and web series, download Torrents, or play online multiplayer games. But before that, let us learn a little bit about SOCKS5 Proxies.
What is a SOCKS5 Proxy?
SOCKS is a stylized version of “Socket Secure.” It’s an internet protocol that enables data transfer between two devices through a third device. In this scenario, the third device would be referred to as a SOCKS server or just a SOCKS proxy. Designed to be an all-purpose proxy solution, SOCKS proxies can handle traffic from virtually any software, protocol, or source, including games, emails, torrents, web pages, and video streaming.
A SOCKS5 proxy enables the routing of network traffic through a server, offering users enhanced security and anonymity compared to traditional web browsing. The most recent iteration of the SOCKS protocol, SOCKS5, offers several enhancements over its predecessor, SOCKS4.
Why use SOCKS5 Proxies?
SOCKS5 proxies are an upgrade over SOCKS4 proxies, as they are faster and offer improved anonymity and versatility. These proxies are suitable for several uses that HTTP(S) IPs are not. Among them are mobile, datacenter, residential, and ISP addresses.
SOCKS5 Proxies are in demand for the following key features:
- Mask your IP address to maintain anonymity and enhance your online privacy.
- Chat and make video calls with geo-restricted apps like Skype, Telegram, or more.
- Access OTT content and streaming websites like Hulu, Twitch, and many more.
- Download Torrent files from BitTorrent, uTorrent, and similar peer-to-peer communication software.
- Play popular online games that are unavailable in your region.
Best SOCKS5 Proxies
It can be a real hassle to sort through all the proxy service providers on the Internet to find the one that best suits your needs, especially when they all claim to be the best. We have done the legwork for you and compiled a list of the top 5 SOCKS5 Proxy services available as of 2025.
1) Decodo
Decodo offers residential, dedicated Datacenter, and mobile IPs that are supported by the SOCKS5 protocol. Reputable customer service, thorough documentation, and user-friendly proxy administration tools distinguish the supplier. Thus, the service is appropriate for both novice and seasoned users.
Get access to millions of SOCKS5-supporting IPs from residential, ISPs, mobile networks, and datacenters; enjoy lightning-fast speeds; and enjoy the greatest degree of interoperability with third-party integrations.
Key Features:
Decodo has a massive pool of residential and mobile proxies with locations worldwide. Every request causes the proxies to change; however, sticky sessions can be maintained for up to 30 minutes. Dedicated datacenter addresses are only available in the US.
- Free Trial for 100MB of residential proxies for up to 3 days.
- An easy and seamless setup experience, along with top-tier anonymous browsing.
- Get 24/7 assistance from the support team anytime and anywhere
- Whether you’re an entrepreneur or a company in growth, pick from cost-effective programs and benefit from the user-friendly dashboard.
Locations: With over 195 location options, Decodo provides global coverage, including major regions like the USA, UK, Canada, Germany, Japan, and India.
IP Network: With a vast pool of over 65 million rotating IP addresses, Decodo ensures dependable and private browsing for all your needs.
Pricing: Decodo offers a range of pricing options, including residential proxies, datacenter proxies, and dedicated proxies.
- Residential Proxies: $6 per month
- Datacenter Proxies: $10 per month
- Dedicated DC Proxies: $7.5 per month
Verdict: Decodo is a well-liked option for safe and effective data scraping. Its wide network of rotating IPs, which includes datacenter and residential alternatives, offers anonymity and dependability.
2) Webshare
Webshare offers SOCKS5 protocol-compatible residential, ISP (shared, dedicated), and datacenter (shared, dedicated) proxies for sale. The service features a robust API, competitive rates, and an intuitive user interface.
Experience one of the fastest SOCKS5 proxies with Webshare. You can buy SOCKS5 proxies with any subscription, including the Datacenter and Residential Proxy plans, and there will be no additional expenses.
Key Features:
With Webshare SOCKS5 proxies, you can accomplish even the most traffic-intensive online activities; the same proxy servers can be used as SOCKS5 proxies or HTTP proxies, depending on your requirements.
- Webshare is unique in the market thanks to its robust infrastructure.
- Feel secure knowing your true IP address is protected from DNS or header leaks and open port checks.
- Datacenter and ISP proxies that are quick and reliable, allowing you complete control over your subscription.
- In addition to configuring the number and locations of proxies, you may also increase traffic, reserve network priority, and add concurrency to the service.
Locations: Over 10 million rotating residential proxies from 195 countries are available on Webshare. While datacenter proxies are available from more than 50 countries, static residential proxies are restricted to the United States.
IP Network: Webshare has intellectual property rights in 20 to 195 countries globally, depending on the product. Although there is a feature to rotate proxies with each connection request, they are provided in lists of static addresses. Moreover, you have the option to have the list automatically refresh up to once every five minutes.
Pricing: One of the benefits of Webshare is that it offers 10 Free proxies to all its customers. If you wish to use more than that, then you can upgrade to one of the following proxy packages.
- Datacenter: Shared Proxies ($2.99 per month); Dedicated Proxies ($40 per month)
- Static Residential: $24 per month
- Rotating Residential: $15 per GB (down to $4.8 per GB for Enterprise plans)
Verdict: For people and small organizations in need of quick and reasonably priced proxy solutions, Webshare is the best option. It works well for various tasks, including social media management, gaming, SEO research, and site scraping.
3) Oxylabs
Oxylabs Premium Residential and Dedicated SOCKS5 Proxies, which offer global targeting in 188 countries, are an excellent choice for activities that require high traffic volumes.
Oxylabs is one of the best tools for gathering online intelligence. It adheres to stringent compliance requirements and corporate ethics. This platform utilizes lawful and ethical data collection to provide businesses worldwide with data-driven insights. It is fantastic for people looking for a trustworthy, in my opinion.
Key Features:
With its innovative and ethical scraping solutions, Oxylabs is a proud leader in the web intelligence collection market. It provides web intelligence insights to individuals aspiring to be leaders in their fields.
- One of the largest proxy pools (175 million+)
- Oxylabs offers a range of proxy types, including data center, residential (shared/dedicated), and mobile proxies, to suit your specific needs.
- Oxylabs allows you to adjust the position, rotation, and stickiness of your proxies, enabling you to set them up precisely as needed.
- Oxylabs offers an extensive pool of over 175 million IP addresses, which is more than sufficient for demanding workloads and large-scale projects.
- If you have any questions or issues, Oxylabs provides 24/7 customer service, allowing you to receive assistance from a dedicated account manager.
Locations: Oxylabs offers residential proxies in 195 countries, providing comprehensive coverage across North America, Europe, and Asia. Additionally, they provide data center IPs with locations across more than 50 countries.
IP Network: With over 175 million IPs available worldwide, Oxylabs boasts a substantial IP pool. This pool ensures that your IP addresses are difficult to identify as proxy IP addresses, offering you a range of possibilities.
Pricing: 11GB of residential proxies are available for $99, which serves as the starting price. The pay-as-you-go plan begins at $10 per gigabyte. More appealing pricing is available for the advanced plans, which include options for 5,000 IPs or 1TB of data. Although the costs are greater than those of other proxy providers, you receive excellent quality service in exchange.
Verdict: With Oxylabs’ Residential Proxies using the SOCKS5 protocol, you can enhance your web scraping experience and access public web data from any location while remaining completely anonymous.
4) Bright Data
One of the best and most highly rated proxy service platforms, Bright Data, offers robust proxy management, comprehensive analytics, and powerful data extraction. This platform modifies the methods used by companies and individuals to gather and examine internet data. I think it’s amazing for anyone looking for a solid answer.
Utilize Bright Data’s Proxy Manager to request high-quality SOCKS5 proxies for scraping purposes.
Key Features:
Bright Data’s premium SOCKS5 proxies are the best option for secure data collection. With an extensive worldwide IP network, unparalleled speed, and a customer-focused methodology. These are a few of its noteworthy Features.:
- More than 72 million IP addresses for homes across 195 nations
- Option to select from pre-paid plans or pay-as-you-go
- Tight guidelines for appropriate usage cases
- Tools for data collecting and proxy management that are well-maintained and useful
- Award-winning instruments for gathering data
Locations: Bright Data ensures excellent availability and dependability through its extensive network of over 72 million IP addresses from 195 countries. The network’s 99.99% uptime ensures customers can expect a seamless experience from any location worldwide.
IP Network: With over 150 million IP addresses, Bright Data boasts one of the largest proxy networks available. Their IP pool comprises over 770,000 shared datacenter IPs from any geography, over 700,000 actual residential IPs for long-term use, over 7 million 3G/4G mobile IPs, and residential proxies rotated from real-peer devices in 195 countries.
Pricing: Prepaid and pay-as-you-go pricing options are available. Prepaid plans are available in four different varieties to best suit your demands and budget, while pay-as-you-go plans start at $15 per gigabyte.
- Starter ($500, $12.5 per GB)
- Advanced ($1000, $11.25 per GB)
- Advanced+ ($2000, $10.5 per GB)
- Enterprise (custom price)
Verdict: Bright Data is ideal for large-scale customers and companies. It offers premium services, including proxy servers, APIs, and site scraping tools. It excels technically with fast residential proxies and a sizable pool.
5) MarsProxies
MarsProxies offers one of the best price/quality ratios on the market and provides a wide range of services. This is a great option for consumers and business customers seeking dependable, straightforward proxies at extremely competitive prices.
Key Features:
MarsProxies is appropriate for web scraping, eCommerce, automation, testing, and other common use cases. It offers four different types of proxies. These are a few of the primary Features.
- Over 1 million residential proxy pools are spread across more than 190 locations.
- Sneaker proxies, datacenter, ISP (static residential), and residential (rotating) proxies.
- Residential traffic that never expires, SOCKS5 support for all services, limitless traffic with PTP datacenter, ISP, and sneaker proxies, daily plans, and round-the-clock assistance are all included.
No hidden fees or upsells.
Locations: With more than 190 locations across the globe, MarsProxies offers real home proxies. For any area that is offered, clients can target by nation, state, or city at no additional cost. The top-visited places across all continents are covered by other proxies:
- ISP proxies: 26 countries
- Datacenter proxies: 29 countries
- Sneaker proxies: 23 countries.
IP Network: MarsProxies controls nearly one million proxies globally, with half of these being actual residential IPs. Although it’s not the largest proxy network in the market, it’s sufficiently big and adaptable for nearly any use case.
Pricing: MarsProxies is a fantastic supplier for small and medium-sized projects since it provides non-expiring residential traffic and completely configurable programs (including daily alternatives).
- Residential proxies start at $0.99 per GB
- ISP proxies start at $1.09 per proxy
- Datacenter proxies start at $0.99 per proxy a day or $1.98 per proxy a month.
Verdict: MarsProxies is dedicated to providing quick, dependable, and affordable proxies for various applications, including online shopping, sneaker copping, and market research. It provides four widely used proxy types tailored for various tasks, so you can select the one that best suits your needs.
Who should use SOCKS5 Proxies?
When people want to access content that is forbidden or bypass firewalls while remaining somewhat anonymous, SOCKS5 proxies are useful. Frequently, they are employed for:
- Accessing Geo-Restricted Content & Websites – By directing their requests through a server situated in a different geographic location, users can access content that might be restricted in their locality.
- Enhanced Privacy – SOCKS5 proxies help prevent websites and services from tracking user activity by disguising the original IP address.
- Peer-to-Peer Sharing – They are frequently used in peer-to-peer networks when users want to share data privately.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the advantages of SOCKS5 proxies?
SOCKS5 proxies come with several key advantages that make them highly efficient for demanding online activities. Unlike SOCKS4, SOCKS5 supports both TCP and UDP protocols, making it ideal for tasks such as VoIP calls and video streaming. It also delivers superior performance, offering the high bandwidth and low latency required for activities where speed and stability are critical. Additionally, SOCKS5 allows authentication through a username and password, adding an extra layer of security compared to older protocols.
How are SOCKS5 proxies different from VPNs?
A virtual private network (VPN) encrypts all data sent over the Internet. It redirects it via an encrypted server, offering complete anonymity and security at the cost of certain performance drops. However, SOCKS5 proxies are better suited for high-performance tasks, such as accessing complex web targets, bypassing geo-restrictions, or gathering real-time data, because they are more flexible, offer faster speeds, and do not encrypt traffic.
How to configure SOCKS5 proxies?
To use SOCKS5 proxies on your Windows or macOS device, ensure they are first activated. On Windows 10/11, go to Settings > Network & Internet > Proxy, enable Auto-detect, then click Edit under Manual proxy setup. Turn on the proxy server and enter your SOCKS5 proxy IP and port number, then save the settings. On MacOS Ventura 13, navigate to System Settings > Network > Open Proxies, enable Auto Proxy Discovery, then enable SOCKS Proxy. Enter the server and port information, and click OK to complete the setup.
Conclusion
Choosing the right SOCKS5 proxy provider is crucial for 2025, especially if you want a balance of speed, reliability, and security. Decodo is an excellent choice, offering access to a vast pool of residential, ISP, and mobile proxies. Its services enable granular targeting by country, city, or ASN, making them ideal for web scraping, bypassing geo-restrictions, and efficiently handling high-demand Android or desktop tasks.
For budget-conscious users, Webshare provides a flexible and affordable option. Its SOCKS5 proxies include both residential and datacenter sources, with customizable subscriptions that allow you to control the number of IPs, traffic, and network priority. Webshare also offers a free plan with 10 shared IPs, an easy-to-use interface, and the ability to refresh IPs, making it beginner-friendly while maintaining stable performance.
Oxylabs stands out for high-performance and scalable solutions. With a 99.95% success rate and over 20M mobile IPs across 140+ countries, Oxylabs’ SOCKS5 proxies deliver fast, reliable connections for gaming, real-time data collection, and secure browsing. Features like unlimited bandwidth, simultaneous sessions, and precise location targeting ensure top-tier performance for demanding users.
Together, these providers offer secure, fast, and versatile SOCKS5 proxy access for a variety of needs.
