A reliable, trustworthy proxy service is the most effective way to ensure maximum security and protect your privacy online. Proxies are intermediaries that serve as gateways between the internet and you.
Their main goal is to keep the things you do online safe by storing your online activities on their servers rather than on your devices. Although it’s virtually impossible to erase your digital footprint, a proxy can give you some degree of anonymity and privacy online.
Proxies allow you to avoid third-party tracking and privacy intrusions by hiding your IP and real location. However, the internet is an abundant source of proxy providers, making it hard to find the right one for your specific needs.
With that in mind, let’s define what a proxy is and how it works and list the top three proxy providers you should check out to ensure you get the best premium service.
What is a proxy?
A proxy is a gateway between the internet user and the web. When you want to access some website on the internet, you use a router to send an online request. A proxy handles the request, reroutes it through its proxy server, and grants you access to the web while hiding your IP address and real location.
Thanks to a proxy, you can browse the internet anonymously, filter web content, unblock geo-restricted content, secure your uploads and downloads, etc. There are many types of proxies, with the main ones being:
- Residential proxies
- Private proxies
- Datacenter proxies
- SOCKS5
- Static
- HTTP proxies
- Rotating proxies
- Mobile
Due to their features and functions, proxies help businesses improve security, ensure protection against traffic throttling and server crashes, increase anonymity, save bandwidth, and more.
Some of the most important proxy features include:
- Firewall
- Network data filtering
- Network connection sharing
- Data caching
- Content filtering
- Filtering encrypted data
- Bypass filters
- Logging
- Accessing services anonymously
Depending on your specific needs and business use case, choosing the right proxy provides your organization with a high level of functionality, security, and privacy. That’s why most businesses use proxies for web scraping, among many other things.
Top 3 proxy providers
If you don’t know how to choose the right proxy, here’s our selection of the top 3 proxy providers for your consideration.
Oxylabs
If you need a perfect proxy service for top-grade network coverage and an array of proxy options, Oxylabs is the right provider for you.
With more than 70 million residential and 2 million datacenter proxies in its pool, Oxylabs offers backconnect gateway servers, mobile IPs, and rotating and static proxies while supporting next-gen and SOCKS5 protocols. The only downside is that you have to manually modify your IPs. Oxylabs also provides high-quality private proxies with increased security. Here’s a great blog article about them.
Pros:
- High level of compatibility with web services and sites
- Top location support
- Chrome extension and proxy API
- Exceptional uptime and service performance
Cons:
- Manual proxy configuration
Bright Data
Many sites ranked Bright Data as the best solution for proxy services on the web. The provider offers three essential proxy types, such as residential, datacenter, and mobile proxies, with their residential proxies dominating the industry.
Although their services are a bit pricey, their proxies are top-grade and trusted by many companies in the market. When it comes to web speed compatibility and security, Bright Data truly delivers.
Pros:
- Huge IP pool
- SOCKS5 support
Cons:
- High price
- Web data extraction
- Poor usability and email support
- Limited bandwidth
Proxy-Seller
Considered the highest-rated datacenter proxy provider by countless web marketers, this provider offers access to HTTPS protocols and SOCKS5 proxies. Their services are easy to use, and the pricing is quite affordable. You can choose from several payment options, such as Bitcoin, credit card, and PayPal.
Pros:
- Flexible payment options
- HTTPS/SOCKS5 support
- High-speed connection
Cons:
- Low compatibility
- Average use case
Features
Oxylabs
Oxylabs gives you to access features such as:
- Huge IP pool – Oxylabs offers more than 70 million residential IPs and 2 million datacenter IPs and extended internet time.
- Three proxy types – you get access to a vast pool of mobile, datacenter, and residential proxies.
- Session control – Oxylabs changes IP for each new browsing session.
Bright Data
When it comes to Bright Data features, these are the ones that stand out:
- Location support – with servers in all countries worldwide and unprecedented geo-targeting support, you get access to proxies in specific countries, states, and cities worldwide.
- Huge proxy network – with Bright Data, you get access to more than 700K datacenter IPs, 72 million residential IPs, and 7 million mobile IPs.
Proxy-Seller
Proxy-Seller features include:
- Excellent customer support – Proxy-Seller can handle any issue in real-time with efficient and responsive live chat. The provider offers ticket support and social media access to handle every issue promptly.
- Top internet speed – response time and top internet speed are among the most important perks of proxies, and Proxy-Seller provides both.
- Solid location coverage – although the provider doesn’t offer global coverage, they cover most countries.
Conclusion
No matter what you use the internet for, privately or professionally, proxies can help you in various ways, such as adding security and anonymity to your browsing sessions and unlocking content in restricted locations.
As for businesses, proxies help with data scraping, data filtering, security monitoring, and more. Today, proxies are among the most vital browsing solutions available.