What are Residential Proxies? An All-You-Need-to-Know Guide

Jun 8, 2023

4 Min Read

A proxy server is much like a remote computer with a location and IP address. It allows you to use the IP address anonymously or transparently, but most prefer the former. Over the years, many proxy servers have emerged, and it can take time to keep track of them.

Residential proxies may be your best weapon if you want to access a hard-to-reach website and collect data. But there is more to residential proxies than simply providing you anonymity. Continue reading to understand how residential proxies work, where you can use them, and why Proxies.Fo has the best plans to offer.

What are Residential Proxies?

Residential Proxies act as intermediary IP addresses, usually borrowed from real users. They are real IP addresses issued by internet service providers, but the proxy provider you choose will reroute the internet traffic from another website or device to yours. The real devices may include mobile phones, laptops, computers, and any other smart desktop devices with a working Wi-Fi connection.

When you use these proxies, the provider allows you to choose specific physical locations from where you can surf freely while concealing your IP addresses. Not all IP addresses can be considered residential IP addresses. Still, for an IP address to identify as a Residential IP, it has to be registered under an internet service provider, not a data center—for example, Vodafone in the US and Verizon in the USA.

Residential proxies differ from datacenter proxies in that the former is less likely to be detected and, thus, more reliable. Residential proxies can further be divided into two types:


How do Residential Proxies Work?

Residential Proxies are similar to other proxy servers in how they function. The residential proxy acts as an intermediary server when your proxy server of choice assigns you an alternative IP address. All of your requests after that would be channeled through that particular address.

When using any other server type, your connection passes through it and directly on the website. With residential proxies, the connection also makes a pit stop at the user’s device to prompt the website into thinking you are a genuine user. This additional step reduces the risk of getting banned or flagged because of suspicious activity. If your IP address can be banned, rotating residential proxies will automatically rotate IP addresses for you.




If you choose an excellent residential proxy provider like Proxies.Fo, your residential proxy servers will include targeting countries and encryption for added security. If you have an excellent proxy service, you can also experience the back-connect method because you are connected to a back-connect server that assigns you residential IPs without manually altering the proxy settings each time. The proxy pool of IPs is never really hosted by the server but acts as a gateway. The selection process for assigning you an IP address may be random or based on any conditions you specify.

What Are Some Of The Uses for a Residential Proxy Network?

Now that we have discussed what residential proxies are in great detail, if you are a beginner, you might wonder what uses a residential proxy could serve. If used sensibly and ethically, you can benefit from any residential proxy in many ways. These are some of the ones that are more sought out:

Social Media Management

It is no secret that good social media marketing can make or break a company in today’s world. Social media, in particular, has become a crucial part of web marketing. By using residential proxies, you could handle several social media accounts on different platforms effectively; plus, you would not have to face any limit on the number of accounts you handle at a time, which would have been the case with any other internet service provider.

Market Price Monitoring

When you want the clients to keep coming back for your products, you must keep up with the market pricing trends and other analytics. For this purpose, sales intelligence software tools can come in handy, but only through residential proxies can you readily use other software. A residential IP address would assist in collecting and monitoring the right data.

Cybersecurity Penetration Testing

Cybersecurity companies want all of their encryptions to be 100% foolproof, especially if these techniques would hide IPs. With a residential proxy, these companies can conduct cybersecurity penetration tests—these tests recreate real-life situations with cybercriminals’ methods to ensure their systems are trustworthy.

Web Scraping

While managing your social media and optimizing your content is the way to start, internet marketing goes beyond that. You need to study competitors and your potential customers to understand what your brand needs to do. You can get hold of a competitor’s information by web scraping through the residential IP address. Since the residential proxy can rotate IPs, you can also conduct mass web scraping and data collection.

Additionally, datacenter proxies can be used for this purpose, but only for small-scale scrapings. Residential proxies will be your best bet if you plan to do large-scale ones on Google, Yahoo, and so on.

Ad Verification

Another common use of residential proxies is checking and verifying the ads displayed on personal pages. Doing so lets you recognize and immediately block any suspicious or harmful ads. If ad verification is not in place, your website will run the risk of brand reputation or information loss. If you choose the right residential proxy service like Proxies.Fo, you would readily control residential IPs to track and monitor all accounts.

SEO Monitoring

There are multiple ways in which a good residential proxy network helps maintain SEO and gather the appropriate data. Emerging SEO agencies may scrape Google and similar search engines to identify research keywords and comprehend competitor trends. Data center IPs cannot be of much help in this regard.

Similarly, you can use residential proxies to support SEO tools so that you may increase your site’s traffic. You can also use residential IPs to support your website in different languages and create links to increase site performance. If you are looking for more, many residential IP addresses would also allow crawling and audit tool downloads.

Accessing Sneaker and Ticket Sites

Shoe and ticket sites are two other websites you can access, but the reasons may differ. Sneaker sites are heavily guarded, so there isn’t any design or identity theft, but you can use residential proxies instead of data centers or sneakers proxies to visit such sites.

Much like the shoe sites, you can utilize residential proxies to compare the prices and deals of tickets across different providers. Most websites trust residential IPs more than data center IPs so that you would get the information without detection.

Site Unblocking

A common use of a residential IP address is to access any site that may be blocked in your region. Residential proxies come with the guarantee that you can visit the site of your choice if you buy from a good provider like Proxies.Fo.

Pros & Cons of Residential Proxies

Even though there are many uses for residential proxies, assessing the benefits and disadvantages of using a residential proxy will give you a better idea.

Pros


  • Residential IPs can be very hard to detect, unlike datacenter IPs which makes them a more reliable choice

  • Good ISP proxies allow precise location tagging up to ASN and city level

  • Your virtual location and IP addresses remain hidden, so your anonymity online is secured.

  • Corporate networks can be protected from online threats, so you do not have to purchase expensive hardware

  • These proxies might be a good choice for countries with restricted human rights since access to restricted content can be readily obtained

  • The IP rotation ensures that web scraping is a swift and easy process


Cons



Why Go for Proxies.Fo Residential Proxy Plan?

In a wide pool of proxy service providers, you might ask: why Proxies.Fo?

Sure, there are number of companies that have been providing these services for some time now, but we do it much better. Our Residential Proxy Plan is one of the fastest residential proxies on the web, where you can choose from 10 Million+ IPs from 150 different countries and even more locations!

Similarly, our residential proxies come from real devices, so there will be no IP bans, and the response time is the lowest. You can try our rotating or static residential proxies based on your needs.


Your anonymity is protected at all times with the supported protocol of HTTP without any compromise on the quality. Because of the unlimited bandwidth, you can deal with the most data-heavy tasks without having to worry about internet speed. Plus, our residential proxies cover geo-tagging and unlimited concurrent sessions.

Our premium proxies are also cost-effective because the residential proxies cost as low as $5! The plan has a money-back guarantee for a limited time, but you can also pay as you go for smaller projects. As proof of our excellent customer service, certain residential proxies have a dedicated account manager to help you swiftly.

 FAQs

Are Residential Proxies Legal?

Residential Proxies are completely legal, and everyone has the right to surf safely and anonymously over the web. However, you must ensure that you do not participate in anything illegal to keep your slate clean!

Can I Get Residential Proxies for Free?

It might be tempting when you see free residential proxies on any website you visit, but beware! Free proxies are a scam since the right services may not be offered, or the company may be making profits off something else. Hence, it is better to buy residential proxies so you are getting your money’s worth.

How Do Proxy Providers Get Hold of Residential IPs?

There are a few ways that the provider would be able to access so many residential proxies. The most trusted ones, like Proxies.Fo, will acquire them legitimately by inserting an SDK into applications, leasing IP spaces from ISPs, or buying traffic from people who have available bandwidth limit.

Conclusion

It wouldn’t be wrong to deduce that residential proxy can be a double-edged sword; those with good intentions would utilize the server for ad verification, SEO strategies, and market price monitoring, but there is also the chance that criminals may use them for phishing scams, damaging other businesses.

But the truth remains that residential proxies can be a lifesaver for automated tasks on your websites. You do not have to worry about your account getting detected or banned while getting the required information. For such cases, Proxies.Fo is just the tool you need to do the job!

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