Proxy guides, comparisons & tutorials
Straight answers about how proxies actually work — the protocols, the trade-offs, and the setups that keep your traffic flowing. No fluff, written by the team that runs the infrastructure.
Guides
What Is a SOCKS5 Proxy? How It Works & When to Use One
How the SOCKS5 protocol actually works, what makes it different from an HTTP proxy, and the workloads it's the right tool for.
GuidesWhat Is a Rotating Proxy? How IP Rotation Works
What rotation actually does to your exit IP, how it differs from sticky sessions, and how to pick the right mode so targets don't trip anti-bot.
GuidesProxies for Web Scraping: A Practical Guide
Picking the right proxy type, rotation, and request pacing so a scrape finishes clean instead of tripping anti-bot defenses.
GuidesProxy Geo-Targeting: How to Access Content by Location
Route traffic through IPs in specific countries to see what local users see — for price checks, ad verification, SEO, and geo-restricted content.
GuidesHow Websites Detect Proxies (And What Actually Helps)
The detection layers sites actually use against proxies — IP databases, TLS/JA4, header analysis, browser fingerprinting — and which countermeasures matter.
GuidesProxies for AI & LLM Data Collection
Why AI training pipelines need proxies, which types work best at scale, and how to collect web data without getting blocked or burning bridges.
GuidesWhat Are ISP Proxies? Static Residential Explained
Datacenter speed with a residential ISP reputation: how ISP (static residential) proxies work, where they win over rotating residential and pure datacenter, and the catch.
GuidesWhat Are Mobile Proxies? 4G/5G Proxies Explained
Carrier-grade NAT means thousands of real users share one mobile IP — so blocking it is costly. How 4G/5G proxies work, where they win, and the trade-offs.
Comparisons
SOCKS5 vs HTTP Proxy: Key Differences Explained
Which proxy type fits your job? A side-by-side of SOCKS5 and HTTP proxies across protocol layer, traffic support, and performance.
ComparisonsResidential vs Datacenter Proxies: Which Should You Use?
Where each proxy type's IPs come from, why targets treat them differently, and a clear rule of thumb for choosing between them.
ComparisonsSticky vs Rotating Proxy Sessions: When to Use Each
A practical decision guide for sticky vs rotating sessions: hold one IP through stateful flows, rotate for independent reads, plus a clear rule of thumb.
ComparisonsPay-As-You-Go vs Subscription Proxies: Cost Guide
Per-GB or a monthly quota? How proxy pricing actually works, what counts as a billed gigabyte, and how to pick the model that costs you less.
ComparisonsProxy vs VPN: Differences and When to Use Each
Both hide your IP, but they work very differently. How proxies and VPNs route traffic, where each wins, and a simple rule for choosing.
ComparisonsForward Proxy vs Reverse Proxy: What's the Difference?
Same word, opposite jobs. A forward proxy acts for the client; a reverse proxy acts for the server. Where each sits, what it does, and which one you actually need.
Tutorials
How to Set Up a SOCKS5 Proxy (curl, Browser & Python)
Copy-paste configs to route curl, a browser, and Python through a SOCKS5 proxy — with auth, remote DNS, and a verification step.
TutorialsHow to Use a Proxy With Python Requests
Build the proxies dict with the http:// form (no extra package) or socks5h:// via requests[socks] for leak-free DNS, pass username:password, verify your egress IP, and rotate country per connection.
TutorialsHow to Use Rotating Proxies With Scrapy
Wire Scrapy to a rotating proxy endpoint the right way — the HTTP proxy URL Scrapy handles natively (no SOCKS helper needed), auth, sane concurrency, and per-connection geo.
TutorialsHow to Use a Proxy With Playwright (Node & Python)
Wire Playwright to a proxy the right way — the launch option vs per-context proxy, username/password auth, leak-free DNS, and rotating egress per browser context.
TutorialsHow to Use a Proxy With Selenium (Python)
Wire Selenium to a proxy the right way — the --proxy-server option, why Chrome can't take a proxy password and how a local forwarder or selenium-wire fixes it, plus leak-free DNS.