Datacenter vs Residential Proxies: Which Should Your Team Buy?
For most teams the first proxy decision is a budget decision. A workflow can run on datacenter IPs, which are quick and inexpensive, or on residential IPs, which cost more per gigabyte because websites treat them as ordinary home visitors. Neither wins in general: the answer depends on the sites each workflow touches, and plenty of teams run both.
This guide gives you a rule to apply target by target, sets out what each pool delivers for its price, and explains why data volume moves the bill more than the rate does. Whichever you choose, use it for legitimate work within each target site's terms of service.
We write these guides for e-commerce, marketing and agency teams that pay for proxies by the gigabyte.
Sort your workflows by target first
- Datacenter for bulk public data from sites that run little or no bot-mitigation, for work where cost per request is the main concern, and for jobs that need speed and many parallel requests, such as keeping a mirror of an API or taking in news feeds. More in web scraping proxies.
- Residential for targets whose bot-mitigation is wary of server IPs, for results that must match what a local user sees, and for ad verification and SEO monitoring.
- Residential Premium or mobile for the hardest targets and for platforms built around phones.
A practical default: start every workflow on datacenter and move a target to residential only when its results show the need. Spend per GB stays low on average, and success rates hold on the sites that count.
What each pool gives you for the money
Datacenter
Datacenter proxies come from address ranges owned by hosting and cloud companies, run on backbones of up to 1 Gbps and start at $3.50/GB. Their weak point is the ASN, which tells a site the traffic comes from servers; strict fraud systems tend to view that with more suspicion.
Residential
Residential proxies use addresses that consumer ISPs give to real households, so a request reads like a home user. That earns more trust on protected sites and makes residential the normal pick for geo-accurate testing, market research and ad verification. The trade-off is speed: residential runs slower, with prices from $3.99/GB. The basics are covered in what are residential proxies.
The two pools at a glance
Prices in the table are pay-as-you-go starting rates per GB.
| Factor | Datacenter | Residential |
|---|---|---|
| Where the IPs come from | Hosting and cloud companies | Household lines from consumer ISPs |
| Trust on strict sites | Lower | High |
| Speed | Very fast (up to 1 Gbps) | Medium |
| Starting price | $3.50/GB | $3.99/GB |
| Location targeting | Country | Country, plus city in major markets |
| Typical team use | Bulk public data, automation, SEO tools | Ad verification, market research, geo-accurate testing |
Why data volume matters more than the rate
Both pools are billed by the gigabyte, so a job's invoice depends mainly on how much it downloads. Collecting mostly text pages uses a fraction of the data that loading full pages in a headless browser does. Run both scenarios through the proxy calculator and compare tiers on the pricing page. When the team has agreed, buy either type; delivery is instant.
Match the pool to the workflow
Every pool is billed per GB and run from the same dashboard, so one team can keep low-cost volume work and high-trust checks side by side.
High-volume collection from unprotected sites, automation, SEO tools
Market research, ad verification and geo-accurate checks on protected sites
Phone-first platforms, app and mobile ad testing
Hard targets where every failed request is costly
Covering several markets in one report? MIX packages combine multi-country residential traffic in a single order. Agencies buying on behalf of clients can apply for the reseller programme.
Get your team running
Per-GB pricing from $3.50 · 55+ countries · instant delivery · 30-day validity · no traffic logs · 24/7 human support
-
1
Size the job
Pick a proxy type in the proxy calculator and enter the gigabytes you expect to use to see the order total.
-
2
Order and pay
Choose the pool on the proxies page and pay by card through Stripe or in crypto through Cryptomus. Each order is billed per GB and does not renew on its own.
-
3
Share access
Credentials appear in the dashboard as soon as payment clears. Add them to each tool with a login or an IP whitelist, then send one test request before the real job starts.
Questions team leads ask
More playbooks for your team
What Are Proxies? A Primer for Business Teams
What a proxy server does for a business team: how the relay works, the main IP types and their per-GB prices,…
Read the playbook →Ad Verification Proxies: A Playbook for Ad-Ops Teams
How ad-ops teams check placements, creatives and landing pages from residential and mobile IPs per market, wh…
Read the playbook →Web Scraping Proxies: Picking a Pool for Each Data Job
The proxy pool a data team needs for each scraping target: datacenter for open sites, residential for protect…
Read the playbook →What Are Residential Proxies? When a Team Needs Home IPs
Residential proxies use real home IPs. Which team workflows need them, how a request travels, how they compar…
Read the playbook →Mobile vs Residential Proxies: Which Fits Your Team's Work?
Mobile proxies use carrier 4G/5G IPs; residential proxies use home broadband. Decide by platform which one yo…
Read the playbook →What Are Datacenter Proxies? The Low-Cost Pool for Volume Work
Datacenter proxies are fast, low-cost IPs hosted in data centres: the team jobs they suit, how a request trav…
Read the playbook →