7 Best Proxies for AI Data Collection

TL;DR: The Best Proxies for AI Data Collection Ranked

Before diving into each proxy provider, here’s a quick overview for those in a hurry:

1. ScraperAPI [best proxies for AI data scraping]

ScraperAPI stands out as a full web scraping solution designed specifically to handle the complexities of both static and dynamic content scraping.

By leveraging machine learning, it rotates IPs intelligently, ensuring requests are routed through the most efficient proxy at any given time. This approach is crucial for AI data collection, as it minimizes downtime and maximizes success rates when scraping data.

ScraperAPI’s ability to handle static and dynamic content, along with its structured data endpoints for popular platforms, makes it ideal for training AI models that rely on diverse data sources.

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.7/5

Key Features

• Intelligent proxy and header rotation: ScraperAPI uses machine learning to optimize proxy rotation and ensure requests are handled efficiently. 
• Smart JavaScript rendering: Renders JavaScript-heavy pages, allowing seamless scraping of dynamic content.
• Structured data endpoints for popular sites: Pre-configured endpoints make scraping from large, in-demand sites more straightforward, saving time on parsing and getting critical information in JSON or CSV format.
• DataPipeline: Allows users to automate recurring scraping tasks, improving workflow efficiency for ongoing data collection.
• Geotargeting for all locations: ScraperAPI supports precise geographic targeting, which enables localized data collection for AI models that need diverse regional datasets.
• Advanced CAPTCHA handling: ScraperAPI automatically handles CAPTCHA challenges, reducing the need for manual intervention.

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

ScraperAPI offers flexible pricing based on the number of API credits, which are deducted only after a successful request instead of per GB or bandwidth, like other web scraping tools. 

The number of credits consumed depends on the domain, the level of protection on the website, and the specific parameters you include in your request. However, this API credit cost is fixed and well-documented.

For example, ScraperAPI’s lowest plan, which is $49, comes with 1,000,000 API Credits, which is equivalent to:

• 1,000,000 successfully scraped pages (1 API credit per request)
• 200,000 successfully scraped ecommerce pages (5 API credits per request)
• 40,000 successfully scraped SERP pages (25 API credits per request)

Here is a breakdown of ScraperAPI’s pricing model:

Visit the ScraperAPI Credits and Requests page to see credit usage in detail.

2. ProxyEmpire [Versatile pricing]

ProxyEmpire is a versatile proxy provider known for its extensive global proxy pool, offering both residential and mobile IPs. This wide IP diversity makes it perfect for businesses that require data from multiple geographic locations, enabling precise data collection across various regions. 

Focusing on flexibility, ProxyEmpire allows users to purchase bandwidth on demand, making it a great choice for AI developers who need control over their proxy usage without committing to large upfront costs. 

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.7/5

Key Features

• 170+ countries and 9,500,000+ worldwide clean IP Addresses
• Geotargeting
• CAPTCHA handling
• Different proxy types
• Dedicated Support

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

ProxyEmpire offers a flexible pricing model that allows users to purchase proxies based on bandwidth. However, it is more expensive compared to ScraperAPI and other competitors, with plans starting at $45 for 5GB. Despite this, ProxyEmpire’s pay-as-you-go option provides flexibility, making it a suitable choice for those who prefer not to commit to long-term plans.

At $49/month, ScraperAPI is better at handling complex, dynamic content with automatic retries and machine-learning-based IP rotation, which ProxyEmpire lacks. ScraperAPI also automates CAPTCHA handling more seamlessly, making it a more suitable option to extract data for AI development.

3. NetNut [Best for high-speed, ISP-based proxies]

NetNut is strictly a proxy provider that can be used with other scraping tools like Selenium. It offers direct routes through ISPs, ensuring consistent, high-speed performance and greater reliability. This makes it a go-to option for large-scale AI data collection tasks where speed and stability are crucial.

Especially for those collecting vast datasets, the reliability of static IPs without frequent rotation is a key advantage for data consistency. 

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.6/5

Key Features

• Direct ISP Connectivity
• Geo-Targeting
• Real-Time Usage Dashboard
• High-Speed Performance
• Geotargeting for All Locations

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

NetNut operates on a subscription model based on bandwidth usage, starting at $300 for 20 GB of monthly data. Its pricing stands out in the mid-to-premium range, justified by its direct ISP connections and its consistency.

The higher price point offers good value for large projects needing stability, but for smaller teams or projects, it might feel restrictive. As usage scales, the cost per GB becomes more competitive. 

However, the lack of smaller, more affordable plans for casual users could be a drawback for those just starting with AI data collection.

Also worth mentioning is that NetNut excels at static ISP connections, so alternatives like ScraperAPI are a better option for projects requiring IP rotation at scale.

ScraperAPI is considerably more affordable than NetNut, making it a better choice for smaller teams, startups, and mid-sized businesses looking to manage costs without sacrificing features. ScraperAPI starts at $49 monthly for 200,000 successful API requests, significantly more accessible than NetNut’s $300 for a 20 GB bandwidth plan.

For larger enterprises or AI developers needing more extensive operations, ScraperAPI scales well, with options for unlimited bandwidth plans starting at $200/month. The lower entry point allows companies to start small and grow their usage over time, adjusting costs as needed, whereas NetNut requires a larger upfront commitment.

4. IPRoyal [Ethically sourced residential proxies]

IPRoyal differentiates itself by offering ethically sourced residential proxies, which is a critical consideration if you value compliance and transparency in data collection practices. This proxy provider ensures that all residential IPs are sourced from real users who consent to sharing their IPs. Its proxies are highly reliable, making them ideal for AI model training, particularly where real-world data is necessary.

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.6/5

Key Features

• Exclusive Proxy Pool
• 34M+ Ethical Proxy Network
• SOCKS5 Supported
• City/State Targeting
• API Access

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

IPRoyal has a competitive and straightforward pricing model. Residential proxies start at $7 per GB, which is attractive for businesses that prioritize ethical data collection without sacrificing performance. The service is priced per GB and proxy, depending on the proxy type you want to use.

What makes IPRoyal different from other services is its non-expiring traffic. In other words, once you’ve bought the amount of traffic (e.g., 100GB), you can use it whenever you want. No monthly commitment is needed – in most cases.

5. SOAX [Best for granular control over IP rotation ]

SOAX stands out for its granular control over IPs, allowing you to manage proxies down to specific sessions and IP addresses. This makes it ideal for AI data collection projects that require precision, such as scraping localized data or handling complex web agents. Its clean proxy pool, combined with its rotating residential and mobile IPs, ensures high success rates even when dealing with challenging targets like geo-restricted or CAPTCHAs-protected websites.

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.4/5

Key Features

• Customizable proxy options
• Residential, US ISP, data center, and mobile IPs
• Granular control over IP rotation
• Real-time performance monitoring
• Worldwide IP coverage

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

SOAX uses a traffic-based pricing model, where you pay based on the amount of data you want to scrape, measured in gigabytes (GB). This model can get expensive for projects that involve downloading lots of content (like images, videos, or multimedia-rich pages). Still, this can be a suitable pricing model for teams without a consistent web scraping workload.

6. Webshare [Best budget-friendly proxy solution]

Webshare is a budget-friendly proxy provider that offers a solid balance of speed, reliability, and anonymity, making it a go-to option if you need affordable yet effective proxies. This provider caters to startups, smaller businesses, and AI developers working with tighter budgets but still require high-quality proxies for their data collection needs. 

It is known for providing a vast number of proxies at an affordable rate without compromising too much on performance. While not as feature-rich as some premium competitors, Webshare delivers solid performance for the price.

Rating [Trustpilot]: 4.1/5

Key Features

• 30M+ Residential IPs
• Customizable Dashboard 
• Fast and Efficient proxies
• Available in 195 countries
• Affordable Pricing

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

Webshare is one of the most affordable proxy server providers on this list, offering free access to 10 proxies for testing. For larger data collection needs, their pricing scales up but remains competitively low compared to other providers, making Webshare a standout option for budget-conscious users who don’t require the advanced features of more expensive competitors.

Although Webshare is cheaper, ScraperAPI’s request-based pricing can be more economical for those needing to efficiently scrape heavier data or dynamic content. ScraperAPI provides more advanced features like machine-learning IP rotation and better handling of complex content, whereas Webshare is more basic and better suited for lightweight tasks. 

7. SmartProxy [Large residential proxy pools]

SmartProxy is a highly trusted proxy provider known for its extensive residential proxy network, offering over 40 million IPs. Its user-friendly dashboard and APIs make it easy for small-scale and large enterprises.

What sets SmartProxy apart is its focus on residential proxies, which are difficult for websites to detect and block. This makes it ideal for bypassing geo-restrictions, CAPTCHAs, and other anti-bot mechanisms, ensuring that AI models can access data globally without IP blocking. 

Rating [Trustpilot]: 3.7/5

Key Features

• Large pool of residential proxies
• Rotating and sticky sessions
• Worldwide coverage
• Excellent API integration
• Bypass CAPTCHAs and geo-restrictions
• User-friendly dashboard
• Unlimited concurrent sessions
• Ready to use API

Pros and Cons

Pricing Breakdown

SmartProxy operates on a bandwidth-based pricing model, meaning you pay based on the volume of data you transfer. This can get expensive if your scraping activities involve high data usage (for example, downloading large amounts of multimedia content or scraping numerous pages).

Still, if you’re looking for extensive residential proxy pools, ScraperAPI offers over 70M+ residential proxies distributed across 150+ countries, giving you even more geotargeting options and a larger pool for IP rotation.

Why proxies are important for gathering data for AI training

Collecting data for AI training comes with several challenges. Websites often employ techniques like 

• IP blocking, 
• geo-restrictions 
• CAPTCHAs 

To mention a few – To prevent automated data gathering. These roadblocks severely hinder data collection, making it difficult to access the large, diverse datasets needed for AI models.

Proxies help overcome these challenges by providing a way to 

• rotate IP addresses, which prevents IP blocking 
• bypass geo-restrictions 
• bypass CAPTCHA systems 

With the right proxy in place, AI developers can collect data from different regions, scrape dynamic content, and maintain high success rates while avoiding detection by anti-bot systems.

Beyond technical hurdles, proxies also ensure that the data gathered is: 

• reliable 
• diverse 
• scalable

For AI training, it’s important to gather data from multiple sources without duplication or errors. Proxies make this possible by allowing seamless access to data from different geographical locations and consistently delivering high-quality data. This helps AI models learn from a broader range of inputs, improving their accuracy and real-world performance.

Key features of effective proxies for AI web agents

• Scalability and bandwidth
• IP diversity (geographical and residential/mobile proxies)
• Speed and low latency
• Bypassing CAPTCHAs and anti-bot systems
• Geotargeting
• Reliability and uptime
• Ethical considerations (avoiding data misuse, compliance)

Why you should use ScraperAPI

ScraperAPI offers better automation and advanced scraping capabilities for AI data collection at a more cost-effective price point for large-scale or complex scraping projects. In addition, its advanced features, such as async scraping and built-in scheduling options, make ScraperAPI the most complete tool on the list.

In terms of proxies alone, ScraperAPI offers a proxy pool of over 150M proxies, including residential and mobile proxies, and a unique smart IP rotation system based on machine learning and statistical analysis. This system generates matching headers and cookies per request and gives you full control over sessions.​​Getting started is as simple as creating a free ScraperAPI account to access your API key and sending your request through our scraping API or one of our structured data endpoints.

With your free account, you’ll receive 5,000 API credits for a seven-day trial, starting whenever you’re ready.

Wrapping up

In AI data collection, proxies are essential for ensuring access to large-scale, diverse datasets without the disruptions caused by IP blocking, geo-restrictions, and CAPTCHAs. Each proxy provider has its strengths, but the right choice depends on your specific needs, including IP diversity, automation, pricing, and the scale of data you need to scrape.

By using the right proxy service, you can gather diverse, reliable, and scalable data essential for training accurate AI models.