Is your web scraping project not yielding the right results? You may be using the wrong type of proxy. We’ve been in the business for 15 years and see businesses make the simplest of mistakes. Any successful web scraping project comes down to using the right set of tools, including a proxy provider that can deliver the right kind of proxies.
NinjaProxy gives you the option to choose between datacenter and residential proxies, as well as mobile proxies. But, we’ll keep this post about the first two for now.
Key Highlights
- A proxy server hides your online identity by assigning you a new IP address.
- The reputation of the IP address plays a crucial role in your anonymity score.
- Datacenter proxies are usually seen as potential spam by bot protection programs.
- Dynamic residential proxies provide the best anonymity online but are slower and unreliable.
What is a Proxy Server?
A quick refresher is needed before we dive into the intricacies of the two proxy types. A proxy server is a remote server that you can connect to use as an intermediary for accessing the Internet.
In the network layout map, a proxy server would sit between you and the destination you want to visit. The nature of a proxy server lets you mask your IP address by relaying traffic through it. Because the source IP address is modified to show the proxy server’s address, the destination server doesn’t get to know the origin of the requests.
Proxies work wonders for businesses that want to leverage the functionality to evade detection for web scraping, or any other activity that requires avoiding IP bans.
Like any networking device, proxy servers also have an IP address. The type of the IP address is what differentiates a datacenter proxy from a residential proxy, or vice versa.
The Role of IP Address in Proxies
An IP address is a string of alphanumeric characters assigned to a networking device. The Internet is a large collection of networks communicating with each other using IP addresses.
Every Internet Service Provider (ISP) and other service providers like web hosting companies get their IP addresses from the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). The IANA distributes unassigned IP addresses to Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) for that purpose.
Usually, the assigned IP addresses are in blocks, since these are large service providers with smaller networks within. It’s easy for networks to identify which IP range belongs to what service providers.
Makes sense? Let’s now look at datacenter proxies and residential proxies.
What is a Datacenter Proxy?
Datacenter proxies are simply proxies that are hosted on datacenter facilities. These large, and often humongous, facilities house hundreds and thousands of servers in racks designed to operate 24/7 without interruptions.
Datacenter proxies are divided into two types: shared and dedicated.
Shared proxies distribute computing resources between multiple users simultaneously. They’re affordable and offer the cheapest way for bulk proxy purchases for large projects. But, they’re also slower, making them less desirable for high-speed activities like streaming. “Slower” here is relative to other proxies; they aren’t unusable by any measure.
Dedicated private proxies reserve the proxy server for use by one user at any time, freeing up the bandwidth of the server for your use. But a dedicated proxy isn’t of much help if the IP address has been polluted through multiple users. Just because it’s assigned to you currently doesn’t erase the history that follows.
In that regard, NinjaProxy offers Premium proxies for businesses seeking the cleanest IPs. They are virgin IP addresses that have never been in use before by any user.
What is a Residential Proxy?
Residential proxies come from running on home Internet connections. These IP addresses are designated for residential users, so they carry a different reputation against anti-bot systems.
Over the past few years, residential proxies have emerged as the favorite proxy type for web scraping projects. They’re highly anonymous with a strong reputation score that significantly reduces the risk of IP bans. Various proxy providers have partnered with residential peer networks that are essentially real users who have volunteered to share their IP addresses for proxy connections.
Datacenter Proxies vs. Residential Proxies - What’s the Difference?
Datacenter proxies can be easily detected through the Autonomous System Number (ASN) from which they belong. An ASN is a collection of networks with a unified routing policy, and is how web traffic passes along different networks before reaching its destination.
Datacenter proxies aren’t inherently bad, but they’re most common for scripted activities like web scraping, so they’re an easy target for anti-bot systems. You can be less suspicious in your activities and get by using datacenter proxies just fine.
On the other hand, residential proxies don’t suffer from the same issues as they’re inherently superior in IP reputation. However, there’s a catch. Dynamic residential proxies can be slower and often unreliable.
The peer network that hosts residential proxies - also known as rotating residential proxies - includes devices of all types, from PCs to smartphones. The varying levels of processing power between the device types mean you can’t expect the same level of performance as datacenter proxies, which run on powerful, enterprise-grade machines with multi-core CPUs and a ton of RAM.
The volunteering nature means that these devices can go offline anytime, and a static IP address is never guaranteed.
Static Residential Proxies - The Best of Both Worlds
Building a rock-solid service that focuses on meeting the complex needs of businesses means betting our resources on the right type of proxies. Instead of building a residential proxy network that’s unreliable, slower, and doesn’t guarantee fixed IP addresses, we built a solution that doesn’t have those weaknesses.
Static residential proxies are hosted on data centers, not a peer network, and they use residential IP addresses sourced directly from ISPs like Comcast and Spectrum. The fast performance of data center hardware combined with the high anonymity of residential IPs offers a fantastic proxy solution for businesses.
Moreover, running on datacenters means we can guarantee a fixed IP address on every connection.
While most activities make use of rotating IP addresses, there may be some situations where a static IP address is required, such as when managing online accounts. Logging in from unknown IP addresses can trigger suspicious activity, which you absolutely should avoid.
Here’s a quick breakdown between all three proxy types:
Let’s Discuss Your Next Project
With NinjaProxy, you get what you pay for. It means no surprise bills and no hidden asterisks in the terms of service.
All of our proxy plans - including Static Residential Proxies - have a straightforward unlimited data usage policy. We want to empower you with the freedom to do what you want without running calculations on how bandwidth the project will take or what happens if one IP goes offline.
Reach out to us via our Contact Us page and let’s get your next project off the ground.
I focus on gathering business leads from multiple directories and listing sites. By using private proxies, I’ve seen way fewer blocks and can reliably expand my contact lists. It’s freed up a lot of my time to focus on fine-tuning my lead generation strategies.
In real estate acquisition, accessing property data efficiently is key. They worked with us to build a custom blend of their proxy offerings—ISP, mobile, and private—which helped us reduce costs while ensuring reliable access to the data we need.
For our line of work, it’s important to appear like typical home internet users. The NinjaProxy ISP proxies blend in naturally, which helps us stay under the radar during online research. It’s been a game-changer in terms of maintaining authenticity.
We pull massive datasets from all over the web to train our models. The premium proxies handle our heavy traffic load without breaking a sweat, and that reliability is crucial for keeping our AI pipelines running smoothly around the clock.
My team needs continuous updates on competitor pricing and product availability. With private proxies, we’re not sharing IP addresses with others, so our data pulls stay steady without random slowdowns or blocks. It’s made our daily analyses far more efficient.
I scrape a wide variety of websites on a tight budget. The shared proxies were easy to set up and work surprisingly well, even during my busiest scraping sessions. I don’t notice any slowdowns, which was my biggest concern going in.
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