Datacenter proxies with Python requests

The requests library sends traffic through a proxy with one argument. This page uses the datacenter tier, which gives you a US datacenter IP and rotates it for every new connection. Swap the password to use any other tier.

What you need

• Your proxy API key, from the Proxies page in the portal.
• Python 3 and pip install requests.

Keep the key out of your source. Read it from an environment variable:

export PB_PROXY_KEY="YOUR_KEY"

Send a request through the proxy

import os
import requests

PROXY = f"http://{os.environ['PB_PROXY_KEY']}:[email protected]:3128"
proxies = {"http": PROXY, "https": PROXY}

r = requests.get("https://api.ipify.org", proxies=proxies, timeout=30)
print(r.text)  # a US datacenter address, for example 203.0.113.7

The username is your API key. The password picks the tier. Always set a timeout: a request with none can hang forever.

Get a new IP each time

The exit address changes when a new connection opens, not on every HTTP request. How you call requests decides which you get.

# New connection on every call, so a new IP every time.
for _ in range(3):
    print(requests.get("https://api.ipify.org", proxies=proxies, timeout=30).text)

# A Session reuses one connection, so the IP stays the same.
with requests.Session() as s:
    s.proxies = proxies
    for _ in range(3):
        print(s.get("https://api.ipify.org", timeout=30).text)

# Session plus Connection: close, so a new IP every time again.
with requests.Session() as s:
    s.proxies = proxies
    s.headers["Connection"] = "close"
    for _ in range(3):
        print(s.get("https://api.ipify.org", timeout=30).text)

Use a plain call, or Connection: close, when you want every request to come from a different address. Use a Session when a site expects the same address across a few requests.

Keep the cost down

Billing counts the bytes on the wire. A new HTTPS connection costs about 4 KB of handshake before your first byte of data, and a reused connection costs a fraction of that. If you do not need a new IP per request, reuse a Session. See how usage is counted.

Use SOCKS5

Install the extra, then use the socks5h scheme on port 1080. The h makes the proxy resolve hostnames.

pip install "requests[socks]"

PROXY = f"socks5h://{os.environ['PB_PROXY_KEY']}:[email protected]:1080"
proxies = {"http": PROXY, "https": PROXY}

Errors

What you see	What it means
407 Proxy Authentication Required	The API key is wrong or missing.
400 Invalid proxy password settings	The password asked for something this tier does not do: a country other than US, a session or a TTL.
A site returns 403	The site is refusing datacenter addresses. Try a residential tier such as standard.
400 Unknown tier "datacentre". Did you mean "datacenter"?	The tier word is a close misspelling of a real tier. Fix the spelling. A password that is not close to any tier, such as x, uses your account's default tier.

More on errors: proxy errors and what they mean.

Related

• Proxy connection format and tiers
• Using SOCKS5
• Datacenter proxies