Packages
A package is your entry point to the proxy network. It’s where your credentials and bandwidth live. Each package has its own:- Product — residential or premium residential.
- Username and password for authentication.
- Bandwidth in GB. Bandwidth never expires.
Sub-users
A sub-user is a separate package carved out of your main package. It has its own username and password, and its own bandwidth allocation, which is deducted from the main package. For example, if your main package has 10 GB and you create 3 sub-users with 1 GB each, the main package is left with 7 GB. Sub-users let you separate teams, customers, or workloads so that one can’t use up another’s bandwidth, and so that each one’s usage is tracked separately. Packages created through the Customer API are sub-users too. See Sub-users.Parameters
Everything about how a request is routed goes in the proxy username, after your package username. Parameters are separated by hyphens:Package: which product?
package is the only required parameter. It selects the product your request uses:
Location: where should the IP be?
country and city limit the eligible IPs to one location:
Pool and modes: how should the IP be picked?
pool limits the request to one sub-pool of the network, and mode changes how the connection behaves:
Session: how long should the IP stay the same?
session and time hold the same IP across requests for a number of minutes:
a1b2.
The full list of parameters is in the Residential proxies reference.
Sessions
A session decides whether consecutive requests share an IP. Without a session, every request is independent. The gateway picks a new IP each time, with no memory of what happened before. This is rotating mode, and it’s the right choice for high-volume work where you don’t need IP continuity. Many workflows need continuity, though. You might need to log in, navigate to a page, and then scrape it from the same IP. That’s what sticky sessions are for. Addsession-<id>-time-<minutes> and every request with that session ID reuses the same IP for up to that many minutes:
Residential IPs belong to real devices on real home connections. A device can occasionally go offline before your session time is up, which means the session gets a new IP. Build multi-step workflows so they can recover from an unexpected IP change.
Pools
The residential network is split into sub-pools, each with its own performance characteristics. By default, the gateway draws from the whole network. Addpool-1 or pool-2 to restrict a request to a single sub-pool. If a target performs poorly, try each pool and compare the results — different targets often perform best on different pools.
Modes
Modes change how the gateway handles your connection. You can use one, both, or neither.Output formats
Once you have a host, port, username, and password, different tools expect them in different layouts. The dashboard and the Customer API can output any of these:
When you use SOCKS5 with URL output, use the
socks5_url layout.
How it all fits together
- Your account has a main package that holds your bandwidth.
- You can split that bandwidth into sub-users, each with its own credentials.
- Every request authenticates with a package’s username and password.
- Parameters in the username choose the product, location, pool, and modes.
- With a session, the gateway keeps the same IP for the time you set. Without one, every request gets a new IP.
- The traffic you send is deducted from the bandwidth of the package you authenticated with.
Next steps
Quickstart
Make your first request in under 5 minutes.
Residential proxies
Full parameter reference for residential proxies.
Premium residential proxies
Clean, high-trust IPs for strict anti-bot targets.
Authentication
How to set up credentials and connect.
