Common Proxy Questions Answered

The questions below are the ones our support team gets most often. Short answers, no filler.

What is a proxy?

A proxy is another IP address you borrow for a request. Instead of the site seeing the address your own connection was given, it sees the proxy's — along with the location and network that address belongs to.

What is a proxy server?

A machine that sits between you and the site you're calling. Your request goes to the proxy, the proxy forwards it, and the answer travels back the same way. It's the point where you can add caching, filtering and access control.

How do proxies work?

They route your traffic through a different IP before it reaches the target. Nothing about your request changes except where the site thinks it came from.

Why would I need one?

Because you need a different kind of IP than the one you have — home, mobile or datacenter — or the same kind from a different place. In practice people reach for a proxy the moment a site starts blocking them or throwing captchas.

What do people use proxies for?

Public data collection, price and stock monitoring, ad verification, managing several accounts on one platform, buying from stores that only ship or price locally, and QA testing what a site looks like from another country.

How do I use a proxy in Chrome?

Chrome uses your operating system's proxy settings: Settings → System → Open your computer's proxy settings, then enter host, port, username and password. For serious multi-account work use an antidetect browser or a per-profile extension instead, so one setting doesn't apply to every tab.

What are residential proxies?

IPs that belong to real home internet connections handed out by consumer ISPs. Because the address looks like an ordinary household, sites treat the traffic as an ordinary visitor.

What are datacenter proxies?

IPs hosted in a datacenter rather than on a home line. They are much faster and much cheaper, and they're the right pick when the target doesn't care where the address comes from — internal tools, uptime checks, bulk downloads.

What is a mobile proxy?

An IP handed out by a mobile carrier over 4G or 5G. Carriers share one address between many subscribers, so mobile IPs carry the most trust of any type — which is why they're used for the strictest platforms.

How do residential proxies rotate?

Every request can leave from a new address, or you can hold one address for a set time — a sticky session. Rotate for scraping, stick for anything with a login or a cart.

What's the difference between transparent, forward and reverse proxies?

A transparent proxy passes your request through untouched and doesn't hide that you're using it. A forward proxy sits in front of the client and speaks to the internet on its behalf — that's the type you buy. A reverse proxy sits in front of the servers and decides which one answers.

Proxy or VPN — which hides my IP?

Both change the address a site sees. A VPN encrypts everything on the device through one tunnel; a proxy changes the route for whatever you point at it and doesn't encrypt on its own. For per-tool, per-profile and per-country control, a proxy is the practical option.

What is an HTTP proxy?

A proxy that understands HTTP, so it can read headers, cache responses and apply rules per request. SOCKS5 works one layer lower and simply moves bytes, which makes it the better fit for non-HTTP traffic.

What is a reverse proxy?

A server placed in front of one or more origin servers that receives client requests and decides where they go. It's used for load balancing, TLS termination and caching — not for changing your own IP.

What's the difference between a proxy and NAT?

NAT rewrites private addresses to a public one so a network can reach the internet at all. A proxy works at the application layer, where it can authenticate, filter, log and cache. They solve different problems and often run side by side.

Are mobile proxies really different?

Yes. Carriers assign addresses from a shared pool, so a single mobile IP has thousands of genuine users behind it over a day. Blocking one is expensive for the site, which is exactly why they get more room.

Which type should I actually buy?

Start with what the target does. If it doesn't care where you come from, use datacenter — it's the cheapest and the fastest. If it blocks datacenter ranges, move to residential. If it blocks residential too, or it's a major social platform, use mobile. If you need one address that never changes, use ISP.

Still unsure? Take the free 250 MB, try the cheapest option that could work, and only move up when it stops working. See pricing.