Datacenter proxy

A datacenter proxy routes your traffic through a server in a hosting facility, so the IP address you present belongs to a cloud or hosting company rather than to a consumer internet connection. No phone, no SIM, no household broadband line — just a machine in a rack with addresses leased in bulk.

Why it matters when you buy proxies

Datacenter addresses are the cheapest and usually the fastest option, because there is no radio link and no home router in the path. They are also the easiest to identify. Every IP belongs to a published ASN, and the ASNs owned by hosting companies are common knowledge — a site can classify your address as a server in one lookup, before it has seen a single request from you.

The second problem is neighbors. Hosting addresses are handed out in contiguous blocks, so one abusive customer can trigger a subnet ban that takes out every address around them, including yours.

A concrete example

Pulling a public API you already have a key for, or load-testing your own staging site, is exactly what datacenter proxies are for: high volume, low cost, and nobody is scoring your address. Logging into consumer platforms from one is the opposite case — that is where a mobile proxy earns its higher price.