Rotating or static proxy servers? It’s one of the most common questions among proxy buyers. Providers don’t help much since they present both types as fit for all use cases, while exactly the opposite is true. This article will look into use cases to help you decide which one to choose.

What are Static and Rotating proxies?

Proxies are intermediary servers that can route users’ network requests, changing how they appear on the target server’s end. If you use a proxy server in Argentina, the end server will treat you as a visitor from this South American country. The reason is that network requests reflect only that last IP address.

• A static proxy is one that uses only one IP address to conceal the identity of its user.
• A rotating proxy is a pool of different IPs that change one another when sending network requests.

Sometimes, users have a lot of freedom to tinker with how the rotation is implemented. Other times, for example, with mobile proxies, the provider handles the rotation. The exact cons and pros of rotation depend on the setup, but, in general, some proxy types benefit more from it than others.

Datacenter proxies run on powerful servers in commercial data centers. This ensures that they are both cheap and fast. They are perfect for rotation because they don’t lose much speed when changing IPs, and it’s affordable to buy lots of them for rotation.

A private static residential proxy is the best example of a premium proxy service. It’s expensive, but it will ensure you have the best geo-targeting and the ability to use one quality IP address indefinitely. It’s counter-productive to use them rotating since you risk sabotaging the IPs in authoritative sites with anti-bot measures.

Use cases of Static and Rotating Proxies

Social Media Management

Marketers and large companies have one specific problem to solve when it comes to social media management. They have multiple accounts on different platforms and only one access point. The terms and conditions of most social media websites do not allow users to have more than one account. This is a measure against bots.

However, different accounts still need to be managed from one place. Whether it’s a large corporation with different branches worldwide or a marketing agency that helps many different clients access their accounts.

Besides location restrictions, there are issues of convenience. Scheduling posts and making other accounts on a simple web browser simply takes too much time. Automating such actions requires specific software that needs proxies to run.

Both issues can be solved quite easily by using static residential proxies. Being hosted in ordinary households means that their IP addresses are indistinguishable from all other users. These proxies also have accurate location targeting and can be assigned to specific accounts.

Rotating proxies of any type isn’t a good fit for social media management since platforms are likely to notice and flag the IP. It might cause the accounts to get banned or restricted in other ways. Both these options can cost money for the account owner.

Web scraping

Collecting data online has never been easier than with web scraping software. It allows users to set an automated bot to visit a website, make a list of all available data, and then extract it in a user-friendly format. Depending on the target website, web scraping can get very complicated as the bot needs to overcome various anti-scraping measures.

One of the first things websites check when trying to prevent web scraping is limiting how much data one visitor collects. Some websites use sophisticated fingerprinting measures, but most of them are still based on identifying users by their IP address. However, it’s only one of the reasons why proxies are crucial for web scraping.

Many websites show different data depending on the visitor’s location. A person from the United States might see a different product selection than one from Europe. If you want to collect a full set of data, you’ll need proxy servers in multiple locations on both continents.

However, you can’t rely only on static proxies as extracting large amounts of data is highly likely to get the IP address banned. Instead, you want to use a rotating datacenter proxy that is able to conceal your web scraper, change geolocations, and not slow down the download speed.

Price monitoring

Companies, especially those running online shops, need constant data about wholesale prices and the prices of their competitors. Otherwise, you risk losing customers or potential profit. Various price monitoring tools can scrape the needed data, but they cannot work without proxy servers.

In this case, rotating proxies are not necessary, as you won’t be collecting that much data. Monitoring only prices once or twice a week, with good software, is unlikely to raise many suspicions. Besides, you need consistency in the data you gather, so switching up locations might be harmful.

That’s why a residential static proxy is usually recommended for price monitoring purposes. You want maximum reliability while the speed or avoiding blocks isn’t your top priority.

Anonymous Browsing

The best use case for static residential proxies is simple anonymous browsing. If you log in to different accounts, such as email or social media, switching your IP address might get you in trouble. It might be against the terms and conditions of websites and get your account banned.

In the best case, you will need to solve lots of CAPATCHAs to prove you aren’t doing anything shady. A static proxy still needs to be changed from time to time to keep you anonymous, but it’s nothing like a rotating proxy changing every thirty minutes or so.

Conclusion

When you need constant connection to accounts or platforms, choose static proxies. If your connection needs to be extra anonymous, go with static residential proxies. Rotating proxies can accomplish such tasks to an extent because they are better for concealing bots when you need to collect lots of data from online sources.