Proxy Service Providers Comparison Table
| Providers | Proxy Type | Proxy Pool | Global Coverage | Starting Price/mo/GB | Free Trial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bright Data | Residential, Datacenter, Mobile | 72M residential, 1.6M datacenter, 7M mobile | 195 countries | Residential: $10.5, Datacenter: $0.08, Mobile: $40 | 7-day (businesses), 3-day (refund individuals) |
| Oxylabs | Dedicated datacenter, Residential | 2M datacenter, 100M residential | 188 countries | Datacenter: $1.8/IP, Residential: $15 | 7-day |
| Smartproxy | Dedicated datacenter | 400K | US | $2.5/IP | 14-day money-back |
| IPRoyal | Datacenter, Residential | 2M | 195 countries | Datacenter: $1.39/IP, Residential: $1.75 | N/A |
| Webshare | Datacenter, Residential | 30M residential | 44 countries | $7.47/IP | Free plan |
| PrivateProxy | Static datacenter, Residential | N/A | N/A | Datacenter: $9/IP, Residential: $5/IP | 7-day (datacenter), 2-day (residential) |
Smartproxy is a versatile solution suitable for businesses of all sizes, from startups to Fortune 500 companies. It offers proxies for market research, social media, and retail purposes, allowing businesses to overcome restrictions and scale their operations.
Key Features
Pros
Cons
Pricing
Prices start from $7.5 monthly, with a 14-day money-back guarantee.
Residential Proxies:
Mobile Proxies:
Dedicated DC Proxies:
Visit -> https://smartproxy.com/proxies/socks5
Webshare is a high-volume provider that processes over 250 billion monthly data points. It supports both HTTP and SOCKS5 proxy, with availability for authentication or password authentication.
Key Features
Pros
Cons
Pricing
Pricing starts at $0.05 per proxy. Residential Proxy begins at $7 per GB.
Visit -> https://www.webshare.io
Oxylabs is a premium service designed for large-scale projects. It offers many products, including residential, data centers, mobile, rotating ISPs, and SOCKS5 proxies.
Key Features
Pros
Cons
Pricing
Residential Proxies:
Dedicated Datacenter Proxies:
Visit -> https://oxylabs.io/products/socks5-proxies
IPRoyal offers a versatile selection of proxies, including top-end residential, datacenter, and niche-specific sneaker proxies.
Key Features
Pros
Cons
Pricing
Visit -> https://iproyal.com
Bright Data (formerly Luminati) is a leading proxy provider with a vast residential, mobile, and data center IPs network. Bright Data offers a fully viable SOCKS5 alternative. Its network is fully secured, enabling HTTPS connections to the super proxies on every continent, ensuring lightning-speed responses.
Key Features
Residential proxies, backconnect rotating proxies, static residential proxies, integrated proxy manager.
Pros
40M+ IPs, 100Gbps network, fast speeds, free trial, affordable plans.
Cons
Usage limits on lower tiers, fewer locations than top providers, no pay-as-you-go.
Visit -> https://brightdata.com
PrivateProxy provides SOCKS5 proxies for web scraping and parsing activities. It offers numerous benefits for different online activities that are not possible with HTTPS proxies, providing users with enhanced privacy and security.
Key Features
Residential proxies, backconnect rotating proxies, sneaker proxies, 24/7 customer support.
Pros
Unmetered bandwidth, 99.99% uptime, fast speeds, free trial, dedicated account manager.
Cons
Smaller proxy pool than competitors, pricier than some options, no pay-as-you-go.
Visit -> https://privateproxy.me
When selecting a SOCKS5 proxy provider, there are several key factors to evaluate:
Security is a top priority when choosing any proxy service. SOCKS5 proxies do not encrypt traffic by default, so it's essential to use providers that offer encryption options like TLS or SSH tunnels for secure connections. Reputable providers will have measures to prevent users’ real IP address leaks. Check that the provider does not store connection logs that can compromise privacy.
The speed of the proxy connection will affect performance for bandwidth-intensive activities like video streaming. Proxies located closer geographically tend to have lower latency. Look for providers with servers in diverse locations to route traffic efficiently. Multi-threaded servers can also handle more simultaneous connections at higher speeds.
Pricing models range from free public proxies to paid premium plans. Free proxies often have slow speeds, usage limits, and less reliability. Paid plans typically offer better performance and features but can get expensive. Evaluate whether the price matches the speed, availability, and support value.
High uptime and low failure rates are essential for consistent proxy access. Check reviews to see providers known for reliability versus those with frequent downtime. Premium plans with dedicated IP addresses reduce the risk of IP blocks compared to shared proxies. Support response time is another factor reflecting reliability.
SOCKS (Socket Secure) is an internet protocol that facilitates network communication between a client and server through a proxy server. The SOCKS protocol, specifically SOCKS5, provides several key benefits:
Compatibility with arbitrary network traffic: Unlike HTTP proxies, which only support HTTP requests, SOCKS5 can route any TCP or UDP traffic. This makes it compatible with various applications and protocols, including web browsing, email, gaming, VoIP, and P2P file sharing.
Bypassing firewalls and network restrictions: SOCKS5 proxies can bypass firewalls, allow access to geo-restricted content, and overcome censorship. The proxy masks the user's IP address and is an intermediary to access blocked resources.
Enhanced performance: SOCKS5 has lower overhead than protocols that use heavy encryption like VPNs. The more minor packet size results in faster data transfers, which improves performance for high-bandwidth activities like video streaming.
Security through authentication: SOCKS5 provides authentication methods to restrict access to authorized users only. This prevents abuse of public SOCKS5 proxies. However, data is not encrypted as with VPNs.