What are Residential Proxies?

Residential proxies are an essential tool for making web scraping more effective and remaining anonymous while browsing the Web. Here is why knowing what they are and how they work is essential for anyone navigating the dynamic world of online activities.

What Are Residential Proxies?

Residential proxies act as intermediaries between your device and the Internet. When routing online traffic through them, these proxies assign you an alternative IP address coming from a real device. The purpose of this process is to hide your IP while providing privateness and security.

Residential proxy servers are real devices connected to home networks whose IPs have been assigned by ISPs (Internet Service Providers), making their IPs genuine and harder to detect. This also means that providers offer the ability to select proxy servers in specific countries and even cities.

How a Residential Proxy Server Works

A residential proxy server is a physical device that allows external users to use its IP address. In detail, the process of routing traffic through residential proxies involves the following steps:

1. The configured residential proxy intercepts the online request made by the user.
2. The proxy forwards the original request to the destination server.
3. he server elaborates the request, which carries the IP of the residential proxy, and sends the response to the proxy.
4. The proxy forwards the server response back to the user, completing the request cycle.

Note that during this process, the user’s IP and identity have never been exposed to the destination server.

Why Use Residential Proxies

The top three reasons to use residential proxies are:

• Anonymity and enhanced online privacy: Residential proxies add an extra layer of privacy and anonymity by replacing your IP with that of a legitimate device in a home network. This strengthens security, protects against tracking, and ensures a confidential online experience.
• Reduced risk of IP bans and blacklisting: These proxies use IPs associated with real residential devices. As a result, the reputation of residential IPs is high, which reduces the risk of experiencing blocks and bans. That minimizes the likelihood of being flagged or restricted by sites, even when using automated bots. Plus, even if you get blocked, rotating residential proxies will give you a new IP in minutes.
• Access to geo-restricted content anywhere and everywhere: By redirecting Internet traffic through devices in specific regions, you can unlock access to content that would otherwise be geographically restricted in your country. This means that residential proxies are a great way to overcome government restrictions, expanding the reach of available information and entertainment.

When to Use a Residential Proxy: Main Use Cases

Residential proxies are a flexible tool that opens up a lot of possibilities in different industries and scenarios. Here, you will see some of their most common use cases.

Web Scraping

Web scraping involves extracting data from sites through automated software. Since
companies know that data is more valuable than oil, they want to make it difficult to
retrieve it, even if it is publicly available on their site. The consequence is that many
websites have anti-scraping solutions in place to ban IPs based on their reputation or how
many requests they make.

Residential proxy providers offer a large set of authentic, high-quality, real IPs, reducing the
risks of tracking and detection. In particular, the ability to rotate among those residential
IPs makes residential proxies an essential tool for avoiding rate limiting measures. This
helps companies and individuals collect large volumes of online data effectively and
efficiently.

Ad Verification
Residential proxies play a key role in ad verification. By giving access to genuine IPs
around the world, users can verify that the right ads are reaching the right audience. This
helps advertisers and marketers to:

• Assess ad performance in diverse geographic locations.
• Measure ad quality, correct placement, and size.
• Prevent fraud, such as false clicks or impressions, ensuring the accuracy of ad analytics.

Consequently, residential proxy servers are indispensable for maintaining the integrity of digital advertising campaigns and maximizing the return on investment. Learn more about this use case.

Price Monitoring
Residential proxies enable users to monitor competitor and e-commerce prices, as well as
track price trends around the world. All of that while remaining anonymous and without
being blocked by target sites.

Thanks to residential IPs, companies and retail customers can collect accurate and up-to-
date price information. This supports companies in designing effective pricing strategies
and helps customers find great deals.

Accessing Sneaker and Ticket Sites
Scarce availability and high demand for limited edition sneakers and event tickets often
lead to online congestion and restrictions. The solution? Using residential proxies
to access these sites from different parts of the world without facing IP bans.

Sneaker enthusiasts and retailers take advantage of this technology to make multiple
requests without being detected, increasing the chances of securing coveted items. That
is such a popular scenario that you can find online residential sneaker proxies and ticket
proxies.

Online Marketing and SEO Monitoring
When it comes to online marketing and SEO monitoring, residential proxies are crucial to
collecting accurate data and conducting market research. Marketers use residential IPs to
view content as it appears to real users in different locations, adjusting marketing
strategies accordingly.

In addition, these proxies allow SEO experts to check search engine rankings and analyze
competitors without being noticed. Here is why the best proxy providers offer solutions
such as SERP API.

Types of Residential Proxies

Depending on the protocol used by the proxy and the nature of their IP, resident proxies can
be classified into different types. Time to see them all!

Note: The categories below are not mutually exclusive. So, you can have a dedicated static
HTTP residential proxy as well as a shared rotating SOCKS residential proxy.

HTTP/HTTPS/SOCKS
Residential proxy servers can operate on different protocols. Generally, the best providers
offer HTTP, HTTPS, and SOCKS residential proxies. Each performs better in different
scenarios, supporting specific online activities.

Dedicated
Dedicated residential proxies allocate unique IP addresses exclusively to individual users.
That mechanism ensures a persistent, reliable, and stable connection with the same IP,
improving security and stability. These proxies are also called “private proxies.”

Shared
Shared residential proxies distribute IP addresses among multiple users. This means that
several users can access the same IP at the same time. While these proxies are a cost-
effective solution, they can have higher latency and be less reliable than dedicated proxies.
At the same time, they provide access to a lot of different IPs.

Static
Static residential proxies assign users a fixed IP address over time. This type of proxy can
be both shared and dedicated, and they are also referred to as ISP proxies.

Rotating
Rotating residential proxies have a pool of IPs available and continue to switch the exit IP
between them. This dynamic approach improves anonymity and reduces the risk of IP
blocking during activities such as web scraping. This is the most common type of
residential proxy server.

Aspects to Consider Before Buying Residential Proxies

Keep in mind that there are dozens of online proxy providers. Some aspects to consider
when choosing the one best suited to your needs are:

• Budget: Choose a residential proxy provider that aligns with your budget. Compare prices online to discover cost-effective solutions.
• IP pool: Prefer providers that control a large IP pool spread across multiple countries for effective geo-targeting.
• Services: Opt for providers offering various types of residential proxies and supporting different protocols. Also, look for additional services like proxy managers, browser extensions, and scraping APIs.
• Latency: Residential proxy servers with a quick response time are better.
• Uptime: Select providers that guarantee high server availability.
• Customer support: Prioritize proxy providers with excellent customer service through different channels.
• Reputation: Research the reputation of providers, placing importance on reliable and ethical services.

Final Thoughts

In this article, you learned that residential proxy providers are a wonderful tool for surfing
the Web with genuine IPs while protecting your identity. Specifically, you understood how a
residential proxy server works and why and when to use it. You also saw some criteria for
choosing a reliable proxy provider. The problem is that there are a myriad of them online
and trying them all will take a lot of time.

Looking for residential proxy providers? Read our details best residential proxies guide.