What to buy first
You do not need the expensive product to start. You need the right shape of the cheap one:
- Start with rotating residential traffic, paid per gigabyte. A few dollars is enough to test properly. Make sure the traffic does not expire — 30-day expiry on a beginner balance means paying for gigabytes you never use.
- Use sticky sessions so an IP stays put for the length of a login rather than changing mid-session.
- Skip mobile and dedicated static IPs at the start. They cost more per identity and solve problems you do not have yet. Upgrade a specific profile when that specific profile earns it.
- Skip anything free. This is the one place where the cheap option is more expensive.
The setup, exactly
- Create the profile, open its proxy section.
- Choose SOCKS5 if your provider offers it, otherwise HTTP.
- Paste host, port, username, password from the provider dashboard.
- Set the profile timezone and language to match the IP's country. This step is free and it is the one beginners skip.
- Test the profile before opening any target site.
The browser's own check tells you the proxy is alive and reports the exit IP. That is the easy half. Open our IP check and leak test inside the profile to see the things that actually get accounts flagged: proxy headers on your requests, a timezone contradicting the IP country, WebRTC handing out a second address, and whether the range belongs to a real ISP or a hosting company.
The four beginner mistakes, in order of frequency
- Free proxies. Then concluding the browser does not work.
- One IP across several profiles. Links the accounts; the ban arrives for all of them together.
- Timezone left on the local machine's setting. A US IP with a Lagos or Dhaka clock is a contradiction checked for free.
- Buying mobile proxies immediately because a forum said they are strongest. Correct and irrelevant if you have nothing yet worth that price.
Where to go next
Once the basics hold, the type decision is the whole game — the residential proxy guide covers rotating versus static versus mobile with real prices. If you move to another browser later, the rules travel: Dolphin Anty, AdsPower and MoreLogin use different menus for identical logic.