Best Residential Proxies 2026: Floppydata, DataImpulse, Evomi +4 More
Seven residential proxy providers worth shortlisting in 2026:
- Floppydata (one balance, three IP types): residential, mobile and datacenter IPs from $1/GB, mobile at the residential rate, 148 countries
- DataImpulse (cheapest first-party): 90M+ IPs, $1/GB pay-as-you-go, traffic never expires
- Evomi (lowest residential price): $0.49/GB, Swiss provider, targeting down to city, ISP and ZIP, plus mobile, datacenter and a Scraper API
- Proxy-Seller (all proxy types): 20M+ IPs, 220+ countries, from $1.99/500 MB; code AUTOMATE15 for 15% off
- Bright Data (enterprise default): 400M+ IPs, $4/GB PAYG with promo, granular targeting
- IPRoyal (best value subscription): 32M+ IPs, from $1.75/GB, non-expiring traffic
- Oxylabs (scale and SLAs): 175M+ IPs, $2.50 to $6/GB tiered
Pick by $/GB, pool fit, and whether you need self-serve or enterprise contracts.
Residential proxies exit through consumer ISP ranges, so requests look like normal home users. That matters when targets block datacenter ASNs (social, travel, sneaker, some SERP stacks). The tradeoff is cost per GB and less predictable latency than bare metal.
This article compares the providers we recommend most often for web scraping and automation, with a decision table, pricing context, and FAQ. Numbers below are vendor-reported rounded figures; use them for orientation, not contracts.
Comparison table
| Provider | Residential pool | Geo targeting | Entry $/GB | Trial / refund | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Floppydata | Residential, mobile and datacenter on one balance, 148 countries | Country, state, city, ASN | $1/GB (30-day validity) or $1.50/GB non-expiring, same rate for mobile | No free traffic; refund review within 3 days if under 1 GB used | Jobs that mix residential, mobile and datacenter IPs on one budget |
| DataImpulse | 90M+ first-party residential, 195 countries | Country (included), city, ZIP, ASN | $1/GB PAYG; traffic never expires | 7-day money-back on first purchase (excl. crypto) | Cost-sensitive teams wanting first-party sourcing and no traffic expiry |
| Evomi | Residential, mobile, and datacenter | Country, region, city, ISP, and ZIP | $0.49 | 1-day trial. 30-day refund. | Lowest residential price |
| Proxy-Seller | 20M+ residential, 220+ countries | Country, city (via support) | From $1.99/500MB, $2.20/GB at 100GB | 3-day trial; 24-hour replacement/refund | City and ISP-level targeting on residential without enterprise minimums |
| Bright Data | 400M+ residential, 195 countries | Country, state, city, ZIP, ASN | PAYG $4/GB with promo; volume tiers ~$2.50/GB | Free trial after business verification | Enterprise scale, compliance-heavy teams, granular targeting |
| IPRoyal | 32M+ residential, 195+ countries | Country & city | From $1.75/GB; non-expiring | 1 GB starter; bulk discounts | Value, bursty workloads, indie/small teams |
| Oxylabs | 175M+ residential, 195+ countries | Country, city, ASN | $6/GB (5GB) down to $2.50/GB (1TB) | One-time free trial via sales contact | Large crawls, performance-sensitive pipelines |
Also worth a look: Apify Proxy (residential at $8/GB through the Apify platform, datacenter and Google SERP groups in the same account, usable inside Actors and Crawlee or externally via proxy.apify.com:8000); Decodo (formerly Smartproxy), aggressive $/GB for many use cases; NetNut, ISP-style routes for longer sessions.
When residential proxies are the wrong tool
- Fat bandwidth jobs (video, uncompressed images, full browser pages at huge concurrency) burn GBs fast.
- Sub-100 ms latency requirements: consumer routes jitter.
- Targets with weak protection: datacenter IPs or direct HTTP are cheaper.
Start with datacenter proxies. Switch to residential only once you confirm that blocks are ASN-based, not selector or parsing errors.
1. Floppydata: residential, mobile and datacenter on one balance
Floppydata sells rotating residential, mobile and datacenter IPs as a single product. You buy gigabytes once, then choose the IP type per connection in the proxy username, so the same balance pays for all three. Mobile 4G/5G traffic costs the same as residential, while most providers on this list charge several times more for carrier IPs.
Why teams pick it: A scraping job rarely needs one IP type. Bulk catalogue pages run fine on datacenter IPs, most targets want residential, and the strictest (social apps, sign-up flows) want mobile. With Floppydata you switch between them by changing type-residential to type-mobile or type-datacenter, with no second plan and no traffic stuck in the wrong product. Targeting goes from country to state, city or ASN across 148 countries and 442 cities (Floppydata's figures); rotation is per request, sticky, or timed from 1 to 60 minutes; HTTP, HTTPS and SOCKS5 (with UDP) all run through one gateway, geo.g-w.info.
http://user-USERNAME-type-residential-country-US-rotation-15:PASSWORD@geo.g-w.info:10080
http://user-USERNAME-type-mobile-country-US-rotation-15:PASSWORD@geo.g-w.info:10080
A REST API (v2) builds these strings, lists locations and reports usage, and the managed Cloud Browser (Chromium you drive over CDP with Playwright or Puppeteer) is free for proxy users: you pay only for the traffic it uses.
Pricing (October 2026): $1.00/GB for traffic valid 30 days, or $1.50/GB for traffic that never expires, the same rate for residential, mobile and datacenter. Orders start at 19 GB ($19). Static residential (ISP) IPs start at $1.79/IP per month and static datacenter IPs at $0.79/IP per month, both with unlimited bandwidth.
What we measured (October 12, 2026): We ran about 200 requests through all three IP types from one test balance, changing nothing but the type- value in the username. Residential succeeded on 80 of 80 requests across the US, UK, Germany, France, Brazil, Japan and India, with a fresh IP on every request and every exit in the country we asked for. The 20 US requests came through 11 different home networks, including Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Charter and Cox, and all 10 requests targeted at California exited in 10 different California cities. Mobile succeeded on 26 of 26, on real carrier networks: T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon in the US, and Vodafone, Telekom and O2 in Germany. Sticky sessions kept the same IP on every request, on both residential and mobile. Amazon.com through US residential and Instagram through US mobile returned 200 on every request. Median response time was 0.8 to 1.9 seconds, depending on the country.
Honest limitations: Floppydata does not publish a residential pool size, and its 148 countries trail the 195 that Bright Data and DataImpulse cover. There is no free traffic: the smallest order is 19 GB, refundable within 3 days only if less than 1 GB has been used. The $1/GB rate expires after 30 days; non-expiring traffic costs $1.50/GB, above DataImpulse's $1/GB with no expiry.
Get Floppydata proxies from $1/GB
2. DataImpulse: first-party residential at $1/GB
DataImpulse sources its 90M+ residential IPs directly through its own bandwidth-sharing app rather than reselling from third-party aggregators. The practical effect is that the same IPs are not resold across multiple proxy brands, which lowers the chance of arriving at a target with reputation already burned by another buyer. On protected sites, that often translates to better success rates than equivalent-priced resold pools deliver.
Why teams pick it: First-party 90M+ pool across 195 countries at a flat $1/GB pay-as-you-go rate. Traffic never expires, so uneven crawl calendars do not waste prepaid GB. Country targeting is included at no extra cost; city, ZIP, and ASN targeting are available on the residential product.
Pricing (May 2026): Intro at $5 for 5 GB ($1/GB), Basic at $50/50 GB ($1/GB), Advanced at $800/1 TB (≈$0.80/GB, a 20% volume discount with a dedicated account manager), and Custom+ from $4,000 for 5 TB+ with personalized configuration. A 7-day money-back guarantee applies to first purchases (excluding crypto payments).
Honest limitations: The 90M+ pool is mid-tier residential and covers the vast majority of scraping workloads. If you are running the very largest crawls against the most aggressive anti-bot stacks where IP overlap drives block rates, Bright Data's 400M+ or Oxylabs' 175M+ may still edge ahead. No enterprise SLA tier at the $1/GB price point.
import requests
proxy = "http://USER:PASS@gw.dataimpulse.com:823"
proxies = {"http": proxy, "https": proxy}
response = requests.get("https://target.com", proxies=proxies)
3. Evomi: lowest residential price
At $0.49/GB, Evomi offers the cheapest residential proxies on the market. Evomi is a Swiss provider. Sticky sessions can hold one residential IP, with targeting by country, region, city, ISP, and ZIP code. It also offers mobile and datacenter proxies, plus a Scraper API.
Pricing (October 2026): $0.49/GB on the 100 GB monthly plan ($49/month, extra GB at the same rate), or $0.99/GB pay-as-you-go from 15 GB with no commitment and no expiry. 1-day trial, 30-day refund.
See Evomi residential pricing · Read our full Evomi review
4. Proxy-Seller: all proxy types, no enterprise minimums
Proxy-Seller covers all five proxy types (datacenter IPv4, IPv6, ISP, residential, and mobile) from one account, at prices that stay competitive against residential-only specialists. The residential pool sits at 20M+ IPs across 220+ countries with per-request or timer-based rotation.
Best for: Teams that need city and ISP-level residential targeting without committing to enterprise pricing tiers. Proxy-Seller's 23-country ISP coverage handles static IP workflows (account warm-up, long-session retail scraping) that pure residential providers handle less well.
Pricing (May 2026): $1.99/500MB at entry scale, dropping to $2.20/GB at 100GB ($25/10GB ≈ $2.50/GB at mid tier). Volume (up to 40%), duration, and auto-renewal (up to 12%) discounts stack. Datacenter IPv6 is available at $0.08/IP for IPv6-compatible targets (Google, Facebook, Reddit).
Honest limitations: Residential pool (20M+ IPs) is smaller than Bright Data's 400M+ and Oxylabs' 175M+. City targeting on residential requires contacting support after purchase, not a self-serve selector. No non-expiring bandwidth model.
Risk: Free replacement or refund within 24 hours if a proxy doesn't work.
Discount: Apply code AUTOMATE15 at checkout for 15% off datacenter, IPv6, ISP, and residential (10% off mobile), stacking on top of the bulk and duration discounts.
5. Bright Data: enterprise default
Bright Data is the incumbent enterprise vendor: huge pool, deep targeting, and compliance tooling (KYC-style flows, audit posture). Integrations span scraping stacks, SERP products, and "unlocker" style APIs.
Why teams pick it: ZIP/ASN targeting, mixed product surface (residential + mobile + ISP + unlocker), and policies aimed at large buyers.
Pricing (May 2026): PAYG at $4/GB with the RESIGB50 promo (list $8/GB), dropping toward $2.50/GB on larger monthly commitments. Verify the live promo before budgeting. Bright Data rotates these regularly.
Honest limitations: Per-GB cost stays the highest in this list once promos expire. Onboarding requires business verification, which slows down hobby projects and lean startups. Overkill for unprotected targets where datacenter proxies succeed.
6. IPRoyal: best subscription value with non-expiring traffic
IPRoyal is the strongest price/flexibility pick once you commit to a subscription. Residential bandwidth starts at $1.75/GB on subscription, and unused traffic rolls forward indefinitely. That matters when your crawl calendar is uneven and you do not want a monthly reset wiping prepaid GB.
Why teams pick it: Predictable packs, 32M+ IPs across 195+ countries, city targeting without enterprise sales, good fit for growth-stage teams that still need real residential exits.
Pricing (May 2026): PAYG starts around $7/GB at 1 GB, drops to $4.90/GB on standard volume tiers, and reaches $1.75/GB at the 500 GB+ commitment level. Bandwidth never expires across all tiers.
Honest limitations: Lower success rate than Bright Data on the very hardest targets (Amazon strict listings, LinkedIn at scale). 32M IP pool is smaller than DataImpulse (90M+) and Bright Data (400M+); IP overlap can show up on aggressive anti-bot stacks. No managed unblocking layer.
See IPRoyal residential pricing
7. Oxylabs: scale and speed story
Oxylabs competes head-on with Bright Data on pool size (175M+ residential IPs across 195+ countries) and performance marketing. The 2026 residential pool now ships with HTTP/3 protocol support and tiered pricing: $6/GB on the 5GB Starter down to $2.50/GB on the 1TB Corporate plan. Independent benchmarks fluctuate; what stays true is that both vendors target large commercial crawlers with global coverage.
Why teams pick it: Very large jobs, dedicated account teams, and feature bundles similar to other top-tier providers.
Honest limitations: Starter pricing ($6/GB) is uncompetitive against DataImpulse and IPRoyal for small jobs. Self-serve trial requires sales contact. Pool size is large but not the largest in the category.
Regulatory note (2026)
The Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP) opened a review of peer-to-peer residential proxy consent practices in early 2026. The investigation targets providers that lease device IPs without sufficiently informed participant consent. Before scaling a P2P residential pool, verify your provider documents how peers opt in and what they're told. Bright Data and IPRoyal publish explicit consent documentation. DataImpulse sources its pool through its own bandwidth-sharing app and describes the network as ethically sourced with participant consent; review their current consent policy before contracting at volume. Evomi sources its residential pool from paid, opt-in volunteer nodes and is a member of the Ethical Web Data Collection Initiative. Floppydata describes its residential, mobile and datacenter IPs as ethically sourced; ask for its peer-consent documentation before contracting at volume. Check Proxy-Seller's terms if you are subject to EU data-handling obligations.
Managed layer: why some teams skip raw proxies
Raw proxy URLs still leave you with fingerprinting, retries, and parsing. Apify Actors bundle execution and maintenance: you pay in compute units (and sometimes per-result fees) instead of tuning every session yourself.
Apify Proxy ships three proxy groups in one account: RESIDENTIAL at $8/GB, datacenter at $1/IP overage (5 IPs free on the free plan, 30 to 500 included on paid tiers), and GOOGLE_SERP at $2.5/1,000 SERPs on Starter dropping to $1.7/1,000 at Business. You attach a group by username (groups-RESIDENTIAL, groups-GOOGLE_SERP, etc.) and route through proxy.apify.com:8000. Residential sticky sessions default to one minute and can be extended by reusing the session ID; datacenter sticky sessions hold for up to 26 hours. Crawlee and the Apify SDK wire this up automatically, but any HTTP client can connect with the proxy URL.
There is no single best provider. Floppydata is the most flexible budget pick: residential, mobile and datacenter IPs share one balance from $1/GB, with mobile at the residential rate. Bright Data and Oxylabs lead for enterprise buyers who need the largest pools, SLAs, and add-on products. DataImpulse is the cheapest first-party residential option at $1/GB pay-as-you-go with non-expiring traffic. Evomi has the lowest residential rate, $0.49/GB, from a Swiss provider that also sells mobile, datacenter, and a Scraper API. IPRoyal is the most efficient subscription choice for bursty mid-volume workloads. Proxy-Seller is the one to pick if you need datacenter, ISP, IPv6, residential, and mobile under a single invoice. If you already run on Apify, start with Apify Proxy and add a third-party pool only when you hit a coverage or pricing limit.
The lowest residential rate on this list is Evomi at $0.49/GB on its 100 GB monthly plan. Pay-as-you-go list pricing runs from $0.99/GB at Evomi and $1/GB at DataImpulse (cheapest first-party residential) and Floppydata ($1/GB for 30-day traffic, $1.50/GB non-expiring, the same rate for mobile) up to $8/GB at Apify Proxy residential. Between those, IPRoyal subscription starts at $1.75/GB, Oxylabs sits at $2.50 to $6/GB on tiered plans, and Bright Data is $4/GB with the RESIGB50 promo (list $8). Large monthly commitments drop the marquee vendors closer to $2.50/GB. Promos rotate, so verify the live pricing page before budgeting.
IPRoyal and DataImpulse both advertise **non-expiring** bandwidth on standard residential plans, and Evomi's pay-as-you-go residential traffic ($0.99/GB) never expires either. Floppydata sells both: $1/GB traffic valid for 30 days, or $1.50/GB that never expires. With IPRoyal, unused GB on residential packs roll until consumed. With DataImpulse, the pay-as-you-go balance never resets across all four tiers (Intro, Basic, Advanced, Custom+). Product details vary by SKU, so confirm on the checkout page before purchase.
Yes for many jobs. Apify Proxy ships three groups inside the platform: RESIDENTIAL ($8/GB), datacenter ($1/IP overage after the plan quota), and GOOGLE_SERP ($2.5/1,000 SERPs on Starter, $1.7/1,000 at Business). You attach a group through the Crawlee or Apify SDK proxy config, or by username when routing through proxy.apify.com:8000. Bring in Bright Data, DataImpulse, IPRoyal, or another vendor only when a target needs a pool or feature Apify Proxy does not cover (large residential volumes at sub-$8/GB, sub-IP geo targeting, or managed Cloudflare unblocking).
Policies differ. Enterprise vendors may require verification or a sales contact, while self-serve vendors usually sell small trial packs. DataImpulse offers a 7-day money-back guarantee on the first purchase (excluding crypto), which functions like a no-risk trial at the $5 Intro tier. Evomi offers a 1-day free trial on Core Residential and a 30-day money-back guarantee on the first purchase. Floppydata has no free traffic; its smallest order is 19 GB ($19), refundable within 3 days if less than 1 GB has been used. Apify's free plan includes $5 in platform credits plus 5 free datacenter proxy IPs, enough to prototype small runs before committing to a GB plan.
Skip them for bandwidth-heavy downloads, when datacenter IPs already succeed, or when you need ultra-stable long sessions (consider ISP-dedicated products instead). Residential shines when **ASN reputation** is the gating factor.