Guides, Tutorials & Insights
Learn about residential proxies, web scraping, data collection strategies, and industry best practices from the Shifter team.
Mobile Proxies vs Residential Proxies: When Each One Actually Makes Sense
Mobile proxies are the hardest to block but the priciest and least stable. Residential wins on pool size, geo, stability, and cost. Here is when each fits.
James Meadow · August 14, 2026 How Residential Proxy Rotation Actually Works
A gateway assigns exit IPs from a live pool of real home connections, controlled by your session token and TTL, and bounded by CGNAT and device churn.
Chris Collins · August 13, 2026 How We Benchmarked 15 Residential Proxy Networks with 15.6 Million Requests
The full method behind the Shifter proxy benchmark series: one machine, identical request volumes, five countries, 15 networks. Results, failures and what the numbers mean.
Chris Collins · August 13, 2026 Shifter vs Decodo: We Counted Every Live IP in 5 Countries
Shifter costs from $0.75/GB against Decodo's $2.75. We sent 560,000 requests through each in 5 countries and counted every unique exit IP. Full results and method.
Chris Collins · August 5, 2026 Reducing Latency When Using Residential Proxies
Residential proxies have a latency floor, but most of the slowness devs complain about is avoidable. Eight techniques to cut proxy latency, in order of impact.
Chris Collins · July 16, 2026 ISP vs Residential Proxies: Which Should You Choose?
ISP and residential proxies are both real-ISP IPs, so it's not about trust. It's static vs rotating and per-IP vs per-GB. A clear guide to picking the right one.
James Meadow · July 2, 2026 What Is a UK Residential Proxy and Why Businesses Need One in 2026
A UK residential proxy routes traffic through real British home IPs. What it is, why SEO, ecommerce, and ad teams need one, and how to choose a provider.
James Meadow · June 29, 2026 What Is a US Residential Proxy and Why Businesses Need One in 2026
A US residential proxy routes traffic through real American home IPs. What it is, why SEO, ecommerce, and ad teams need one, and how to choose a provider.
James Meadow · June 28, 2026 Five Advantages of Using Residential Proxies for Web Data Collection
Why data teams use residential proxies for web data collection: higher success rates, unbiased coverage, geo-accurate data, scale, and reliable monitoring.
Matt Brown · June 27, 2026