Quick start
Sticky sessions and rotation
Keep one exit address for a whole task, or change it on every request, and know when to use which.
This guide is part of the ProxyOnly quick-start series. It assumes nothing and takes a few minutes. Prices are live, and you can start with a balance of one US dollar in any of the 63 countries we stock.
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- Sticky sessions and rotation
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Two ways to use an address
A rotating setup can send each request from a different address in the country you asked for. A sticky session keeps the same exit for a period, which is what you want whenever a website expects one visitor to stay the same visitor from the first page to the last.
Neither is better in general. Rotation spreads many independent requests across many addresses. Stickiness keeps a logged-in or multi-step journey consistent.
Pinning a session
On gateway access, add a session name to the username. Reuse the same name to keep the exit and use a new name when you want a different one. Omit it, or pass session-rotate, to get a new exit on each request.
A name can be anything short, such as qa42, checkout1 or a job number. Use one name per task, not one for everything, otherwise unrelated jobs share an address.
username-country-us # new exit each request
username-country-us-session-qa42 # same exit for session qa42
username-country-us-session-rotate # rotate explicitlyChoosing between them
Choose sticky for sign-ins, shopping carts, checkout tests, forms with several steps and bug reports that someone has to reproduce. Choose rotating for collecting many public pages, price monitoring across many products, and any job where requests do not depend on each other.
How long a session lasts depends on the service and on the pool, so a very long task should be written to survive a change of address. Check for an expired session, and retry with a fresh one instead of assuming the address will always remain.
Static proxies are sticky by nature
A datacenter or ISP proxy that you rent has a fixed address for the whole rental period, so it behaves like a permanent sticky session. If you want rotation with static proxies, spread your requests across several of them in your own code, one after another or at random.
Which proxy type fits any country
Pick the proxy type from the job rather than the price. Here is how the types we sell compare, so you can match one to your work in any country:
Datacenter IPv4. The default choice for most jobs. These are dedicated IPv4 addresses hosted in a datacenter, fast and inexpensive, and the best fit for high-volume reading of public pages, monitoring and automation. Some websites treat datacenter ranges more cautiously than consumer connections, so test your target before you commit to a long rental.
ISP proxies. Static addresses that are registered to an internet service provider rather than a hosting company. They keep the speed of datacenter hardware and look more like an ordinary home or office connection, which helps with destinations that are strict about hosting ranges.
Shared IPv4. A shared address is used by more than one customer and costs less. It suits light tasks, quick checks and testing where a clean, exclusive address is not essential.
IPv6. IPv6 addresses are very cheap and plentiful, and they work well with destinations that serve IPv6 traffic, such as many large search, video and social platforms. Many smaller sites are still IPv4 only, so check that your target supports IPv6 before you buy.
Mobile proxies. Addresses from mobile carrier networks. Many phones share the same carrier address, so websites tend to be tolerant of this traffic, which makes mobile proxies the right choice for testing mobile ads, apps and landing pages. They cost more than datacenter addresses.
Residential proxies. Addresses from home internet connections, billed by the amount of traffic you use and not by the IP. They suit light, bursty jobs on sites that block datacenter and ISP ranges. Heavy traffic gets expensive quickly, so estimate your monthly volume first.
If you are unsure, rent one address of the type you think you need, run your real task against it for a day, and look at the success rate. Because rental periods start at a few days, trying a type costs very little.
Using proxies responsibly in any country
A proxy is a networking tool and it is lawful in most places, but what you do with it still has to be lawful and fair. Follow the laws that apply to you and to the place you send traffic to, read the terms of the sites you visit, honour robots rules and rate limits, and never use an address to access accounts or data that are not yours. ProxyOnly cannot give legal advice, and our acceptable use policy applies to every order.
In practice that means reading public pages, checking your own sites and ads, and testing your own products. If a task would be unwelcome to the site owner when done by hand, it is unwelcome when done through a proxy too.
Frequently asked questions
How do I keep the same IP?
Add a session name to the username, for example username-country-us-session-qa42, and reuse it.
How do I get a new IP?
Use a new session name, or leave the session out so that each request can use a new exit.
Do static proxies rotate?
No. A rented datacenter or ISP address stays the same for the rental period.
Can a sticky session end by itself?
Yes, sessions are limited in time, so write your task to handle a change of address and retry.
Ready to try it?
Create an account, add funds from US$1 and pick your country and proxy type.