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Guide

Datacenter proxies

Datacenter proxies run from hosting infrastructure. Nothing about the route is indirect, which makes them the fastest and cheapest option available, and also the easiest for a site to identify, because hosting ranges are published.

The fastest option, by a clear margin

A data centre link is built for throughput in a way a home connection is not. For high volume work against targets that do not fingerprint, nothing else comes close on speed or on cost per gigabyte.

They are identifiable, and that is the whole trade

The address ranges belonging to hosting providers are a matter of public record. Any site that wants to know whether traffic comes from a server can find out in one lookup, and sites that care will act on it.

Try them first anyway

A large share of targets do not check. Escalating to residential before you have confirmed a block is paying several times more for an outcome you already had.

Metered and unlimited both offered

Per gigabyte suits variable work; unlimited windows suit sustained throughput where the volume would make metering expensive. Which is cheaper depends entirely on how hard you are going to push it.

What to buy

Default to datacenter. Move up to ISP or residential only once you have actually seen blocks.

Common questions

Why is datacenter cheaper?

Because the addresses come from server networks, where they are plentiful and cost the operator very little, rather than from consumer lines that have to be sourced one household at a time. That abundance is the entire price difference, and it is also the entire weakness, since the same abundance makes the ranges easy to recognise.

What is datacenter genuinely good at?

Speed, volume and price against targets that do not care who is asking. Public documentation, uptime checking, anything you own, and a large share of ordinary catalogue and listing collection. It is the correct default for that work, and switching to residential before you have been blocked is money spent on a problem you do not have.

Will a datacenter address get blocked?

Against some targets, yes, and quickly. Sites that care about visitor identity keep lists of server ranges and treat them differently, sometimes by blocking and sometimes by quietly serving different content. Test against your actual target rather than assuming, because the answer varies enormously between sites.

Try it against your own target

Metered bandwidth is billed per gigabyte and does not expire, so testing a small amount against the site you actually care about costs very little. See what the network covers if you have not seen it.

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