10 Best Residential Proxy Pool of 2023
Are you looking for a proxy provider with the best residential proxy pool to use for your Internet marketing operations? Then you are on the right page as the article below recommends some of the best providers out there.
the Best Residential Proxy services
- Bright Data — Overall Best Residential Proxy Pools
- Soax — Cleanest Residential Proxy Pool
- Smartproxy — Fastest Residential Proxy Pool
- Proxy-cheap — Cheap High-Quality Residential Proxies
- Shifter — Unlimited Bandwidth Support
The invention of residential proxy pools is a game changer in the proxy industry. Unlike in the past when users had to use datacenter IPs that evenly get blocked, proxy users can now have access to millions of IP addresses from different locations around the world — all of which can’t be differentiated from that of regular users. This is because they actually make use of the devices of the regular users to get the IPs as well as route the requests through.
For providers with residential proxy pools, you are given access to the whole pool and charged based on bandwidth consumption. There are a good number of residential proxy pools in the market. While some of them are excellent, others are good, some are bad and can be terrible. In this article, I will be describing some of the best residential proxy pools out there that you can make use of. I have researched all of these providers and picked them out of a huge list of providers I have also researched.
Bright Data — Overall Best Residential Proxy Pools
Bright Data is the most advanced proxy provider in the market and can even be seen as the market leader. This provider has one of the largest proxy pools in the market with over 72 million IP addresses in it. Its IPs are ethically sourced as it offers some free apps such as Hola VPN that users use for free and agree to join their P2P network. One thing you will come to like about this service is its performance.
Currently, it is the fastest residential proxy network — I recorded a download of 36.82 Mbps with a response time of 696 ms. It has the best location coverage as all countries and most major cities are captured and you can use its geo-targeting feature to choose IPs from a specific location. Bright Data's residential proxy network offers rotating proxies.
However, it has the best session control system, as you can decide to maintain the same IP and by extension session for an extended period of time. Pricing is affordable as you can get started with $10.5 per GB using their pay-as-you-go payment model.
Pros & Cons of Bright Data
Soax — Cleanest Residential Proxy Pool
Soax hasn’t been in the market for as long as Bright Data has existed. However, the developers hit the ground running and now this provider is one of the top providers in the market. Performance-wise, I recorded an average download speed of 24.85 Mbps with a response time of 895 ms. It residential proxy pool is regarded as one of the best because of how well they monitor the pool to remove bad IPs. This reduces the number of retries and dropped connections you will experience using residential proxy pools.
The number of IPs in its pool is not as huge as Bright Data as there are only over 5 million IP addresses in it. Another difference between this provider and Bright Data is in IP rotation. For Bright Data, you can rotate IPs after every request or a specific period of time. But for Soax, IP rotation is only time-based.
This and the fact that there is no support for the pay-as-you-go option which makes Soax expensive make Bright Data the favorite of many proxy users. In fact, to get started using Soax, you need to spend a minimum of $99 monthly.
Pros & Cons of Soax
Smartproxy — Fastest Residential Proxy Pool
The Smartproxy service is one of the services I have come to like and use for my personal projects over the years. First, it is a premium proxy provider and comes with many advanced features. However, its pricing is the cheapest among the premium providers. This service pricing starts from $8.5 per GB for their pay-as-you-go option and you get even more discounts for packaged plans. But this is not the point here. The reason it is captured here is because it is the fastest in the market in terms of response time.
While testing out the service, I recorded a response time of 647 ms which is the fastest I have gotten in the market segment so far. Its download speed is 34.45 Mbps which places it head-to-head with Bright Data. But that is not all, it also operates one of the largest proxy pools with over 52 million IPs sourced from over 195 countries across the globe. While the IPs are rotating, you can use their sticky IP option to maintain IP and session for up to 30 minutes.
Pros & Cons of Smartproxy
IPRoyal — Good Proxy Pool for Small Proxy Users
The IPRoyal service is one of those services you will want to avoid if you are a heavy user that needs hundreds of thousands of IPs for your tasks. However, if you are a small proxy user, there are a few reasons you will want to make use of their residential proxy pool. First, even though they have a small pool of over 2 million IPs, this size is big enough for you to use for your tasks. Secondly, you won’t have to deal with the dilemma that your bandwidth will expire as it doesn’t provided you didn’t exhaust it.
Last but not least, its pricing is cheap as it starts from $7 per GB. The service offers only rotating proxies for their residential proxy option — and you can either choose from random IP change or time-based IP rotation. In terms of performance, this service is just average as I recorded an average download speed of 19.64 Mbps with a response time of 973 ms.
Pros & Cons of IPRoyal
Proxy-cheap — Cheap High-Quality Residential Proxies
From the name of this provider, you can tell they have their eyes on pricing — and yes, they do. With this service, you can get started with $5 per GB, and the more bandwidth you purchase in a plan, the cheaper the price per GB gets. Proxy-cheap has over 6.9 million IP addresses in its pool that you can use. These IPs are sourced from over 127 countries across the globe. The proxies here do not offer static IPs but rotate IPs to mask your activities.
However, you can use their sticky session support to maintain the same IP address for up to 30 minutes. In terms of performance, this service averages a download speed of 24.84 Mbps with a response time of 749 ms which is considered fast. The service allows them to enjoy unlimited access to their proxy pool, the ability to create unlimited sessions, and send concurrent requests. The only throttling done here is bandwidth consumption and that is what forms the basis for its pricing.
Pros & Cons of Proxy-cheap
Shifter — Unlimited Bandwidth Support
The Shifter proxy service is one of the oldest proxy providers out there. This provider started in 2012 as Microleaves before rebranding into Shifter. Currently, it is one of the best residential proxy networks and its pool can be said to be one of the largest out there. It has over 31 million IP addresses in it that you can use. While it has many packages and plans, the one of interest to us here is its special rotating proxies which can be used on even the most lethal website. One thing you will come to like about this service is its support for unlimited bandwidth usage.
However, because you are allowed to consume unlimited bandwidth, the number of ports available to you is limited and forms the basis for its pricing. In terms of performance, this provider is seen as average as I recorded a download speed of 23.84 Mbps with a response time of 849 ms. Pricing is a little pricey as you require a minimum of $199 to get started with the service.
Pros & Cons of Shifter
ProxyEmpire — Bandwidth Roll Over Support
Another provider I will recommend to their proxy pool is the ProxyEmpire service. Their residential pool has over 5 million IP addresses in it which looks medium. However, this is the reason it is even captured here. If you’re a small proxy user who doesn’t consume your bandwidth at the end of the month, then this is a good option. For the other providers mentioned above, bandwidth expires after one month. However, for this, the bandwidth gets rolled over for you.
But this is not the only reason this provider is loved by many. Its IPs are highly undetectable and can be used for a good number of tasks ranging from account management to web automation — thanks to its session control feature and automatic IP rotation. I recorded a download speed of 19.84 Mbps with a response time of 749 ms. My major problem with this service is its pricing. Pricing starts from $15 per GB which is even more expensive than the premium providers like Bright Data and Smartproxy.
Pros & Cons of ProxyEmpire
ASocks — Cheapest Residential Proxy Pool
The ASocks service is quite new in the market — and it is already making its mark. The unique thing about this provider is its pricing which is the cheapest in the residential proxy market that works. With just $3, you can purchase 1GB of bandwidth. And this price is not just for their residential proxies — even the mobile proxies are priced the same. Even though the proxies are cheap, they are undetectable. This is because they use the same technology as the other providers as they route requests via the devices of real Internet users.
As with the other proxy networks discussed in this article, I tested its performance and recorded an average download speed of 17.73 Mbps with a response time of 968 ms which isn’t as fast as the other mentioned providers — but still fast enough to get your tasks done. It has got a pool with over 7 million IP addresses sourced from over 100 countries across the globe.
Pros & Cons of ASocks
Hydraproxy — Support Endless Proxy Endpoint Generation
Hydraproxy is another provider I have come to like. I see it as the best alternative to the proxy-cheap service as they are within the same price range and have almost the same features and pool size. However, Hydraproxy has over 5 million IP addresses which is a little less than what you get from Proxy-cheap. But Hydraproxy has a feature you will like — supports endless proxy endpoint generation. This service offers you a tool that you can use to generate as many proxy IP addresses and ports as you want and use them simultaneously at no extra cost.
In terms of performance, you should have any issues with it for the most part as its download speed as recorded by me is 24.79 Mbps which is an acceptable download speed for residential proxies. It is the response time that is a little disappointing as I recorded a response time of 985 ms. It does have support for over 100 countries across the globe that you can get IP addresses from.
Pros & Cons of Hydraproxy
Nimbleway — High-Performance Residential Proxy Network
If you are an enterprise or a representative, I suggest you take a look at the Nimbleway service. The residential proxy pool provided here is one of the best. Unlike other providers, they don’t tell you the number of IPs they have. But considering the kind of customers they have, the number is in the millions. As with others, the proxies are rotating proxies. However, this service prioritizes new IPs in their pool in a bid to minimize reusing IPs which is a good thing.
While testing out their proxies, I recorded an average download speed of 34.78 Mbps with a response time of 583 ms which puts it head-to-head with Bright Data, the leading residential proxy pool. It has IPs in over 100 countries in the world and offers one of the most granular geo-targeting options ranging from country to state level targeting down to city level.
Pros & Cons of Nimbleway
Oxylabs — Largest Residential Proxy Pool
Oxylabs is one of the premium residential proxy providers out there. And to be frank with you, it was my favorite some times back until it started having issues related to too many drop connections and retries. This has been fixed now and currently, this service has the largest proxy pool in the market with over 100 million IP addresses in it. These IPs are sourced from all countries and most cities around the world and you can choose the locations you need IPs from. This makes them perfect for scraping geo-location content.
Its large proxy pool also makes it a good candidate for those with large projects to make use of. Its performance is above average in terms of download speed and response time as I recorded 31.95 Mbps and 782 ms respectively. Its pricing is affordable especially if you go for its pay-as-you-go payment option. As with Bright Data, KYC is compulsory here for compliance's sake.
Pros & Cons of Oxylabs
IP2World — Good Residential Proxy Pool
The IP2World residential proxy pool is another proxy pool I would recommend. The service advertised they have a pool with over 90 million IP addresses. As with the other services, it is highly difficult to find this out. The only method that comes close is for you to send hundreds of thousands of requires and see how many of the IPs are unique. I tried this out and got a little over 50% unique IPs.
This does not tell whether their IP pool is up to 90 million or not — it just tells you a lot of the IPs that will be assigned to you won’t be unique. Aside from this issue, this provider offers some of the most undetectable IPs around. In terms of download speed, it is average as I recorded an average speed of 23.92 Mbps with a response time of 836 ms. It does have good location support and can be used for a good number of tasks.
Pros & Cons of IP2World
Geonode — Cheap Mid-Size Proxy Pool
The Geonode is one of the youngest residential proxy pools on the list. But it is already one of the fastest growing in terms of customer base and number of IPs in its pool. Currently, it claims to have over 30 million IP addresses in its pool. One thing you will come to like about this service is that you only get to pay for successful requests as you aren’t charged for requests that fail. But that is not all.
As with other providers, I tested its performance and the result was OK. The download speed recorded was 28.95 Mbps with a response time of 762 ms. The network as with others doesn’t own the IPs in its pool — they are sourced via P2P networks with participants all over the world. Using this, you can access geo-targeted content from over 160 countries and most major cities. Pricing for this service starts from $4 per GB, which makes it one of the cheapest on the list.
Pros & Cons of Geonode
Netnut — Best for Enterprise Data Collection
Netnut is another provider I recommend its residential proxy pool. However, looking at its minimum monetary requirement, you can tell it is not ready to entertain small proxy users. You need $800 to get started with using this provider which is not an amount most proxy users are ready to spend. But away from that, if you are an enterprise user, this provider is one of the ones you can use. It has one of the largest proxy pools in the market with over 55 million IP addresses. It performs well and scales well.
I got a test account from them and recorded a download speed of 37.59 Mbps with a response time of 621 ms which is one of the fastest. Even after increasing the number of concurrent connections, the speed remains unchanged. You can choose IPs from over 200 locations using their geo-targeting option. If you are an enterprise, you can contact their support do a KYC, and get a free trial.
Pros & Cons of Netnut
Rayobyte — Best for Free Trial Support
Last on my list is the Rayobyte service. In the past, I would have ranked it at the top. However, it has refused to innovate like others. Currently, it can at best be described as one of the best residential proxy networks out there. But nothing really differentiates it from the other providers in the market. The only thing I could think of is the fact that it offers you a free trial with no strings attached. Each new user is given 50MB to try out the service.
There was a time when the number of IPs in its pool was put at 10 million. But now, what is displayed is that you can get hundreds of thousands of IPs. While the size of their pool is a disappointment, the effectiveness of their proxies and how undetectable they are is a plus. In terms of performance, I recorded a download speed of 27.93 Mbps with a response time of 673 ms. Pricing for the service is quite affordable as 1GB is priced at $9.
Pros & Cons of Rayobyte
FAQs
Q. What is a Residential Proxy Pool?
A residential proxy pool is a group of IP addresses under the control of a residential proxy network through which your web requests are routed through. For the most part, the providers do not own the IP addresses in the pool. They are gotten via P2P networks where participants join either willing to get something in return or even without their consent. Because of the method of obtaining these IP addresses, most residential proxy networks have millions of residential IP addresses in their pool.
Q. Are Residential Proxy Pools Good for Account Management?
Residential proxy pools are the source of the highest quality of IP addresses you can use as a proxy user. As such, their proxies can be used for managing accounts on most websites and applications. However, there is an issue most of them have. Because they do not own the IP addresses in their pool, IPs can’t be maintained for long and that is why they rotate IPs. So, you can only maintain the session and IP for 30 minutes for most and at most one hour. If you need to maintain IP for as long as you want, then get a static residential proxy.
Q. Are Residential Proxy Pools Legal?
The answer to this depends on how the IPs were obtained. If the IPs were ethically obtained and the users that join the P2P networks consent to their IPs being used, then there is no issue. However, if the provider gets these IPs via unethical means, then doing so becomes illegal as gaining control over the devices of others without their consent is termed illegal. As a user, you are better off sticking to a provider that gets its IP addresses via ethical means.
Conclusion
Residential proxy pools have become extremely important to the web automation industry because of the undetectable proxies they offer. And their usage will only increase. However, to get the most out of them, you have to choose the right one for your project based on your specific project requirements. The above proxy providers own some of the best residential proxy pools in the market right now.
