Bright Data vs Oxylabs: 2026 Head-to-Head Comparison
Bright Data and Oxylabs are the two proxy networks every serious scraping team ends up evaluating at some point, and for good reason. Between them they cover most of the residential, mobile, datacenter, and ISP proxy market that isn’t running on a shoestring budget. I’ve run both through real jobs, not just trial accounts, and the honest answer is neither one is a clean winner across the board. They’re built by different companies with different priorities, and those priorities show up in the pricing tiers, the session controls, and who each one is actually optimized for.
Bright Data (formerly Luminati) leans into scale and compliance. It’s the network Fortune 500 data teams pick when procurement asks about KYC processes and IP sourcing audits. Oxylabs leans into raw pool size and predictable, tiered pricing that scales cleanly from a $30/month starter plan up to a five-figure enterprise contract. If you’re price monitoring at Fortune 500 scale, Bright Data’s compliance posture and no-minimum pay-as-you-go option matter more than a few cents per GB. If you’re running SEO rank tracking or SERP scraping where response time is the bottleneck, Oxylabs’ benchmarked speed numbers make a real difference.
This comparison walks through both networks on the axes that actually change outcomes for scraping and automation work: pool size, rotation, geo coverage, success rates, speed, price per GB, session persistence, and concurrency limits. I’ll flag where vendor marketing and independent benchmarks disagree, because on this topic they often do.
TL;DR comparison table
| Bright Data | Oxylabs | |
|---|---|---|
| Residential IP pool | 150M+ across 195 countries | 175M+ across 195 countries |
| Entry pricing (residential) | $8/GB pay-as-you-go, no minimum (promo pricing to ~$4/GB) | $6/GB on Starter, $30/month minimum for 5GB |
| Best committed rate | $2.50/GB at $1,999/month (798GB) | $2.50/GB at $2,500/month (1TB) |
| Datacenter proxies | From ~$0.50-1.20/GB shared pool | From ~$0.59/GB traffic-based |
| ISP proxies | ~$1.50-3.00 per IP/month | From ~$1.60 per IP |
| Mobile proxies | ~$9-20+/GB depending on targeting | ~$7.50/GB down to $3.50/GB at scale (subscription only) |
| Session persistence | Configurable sticky sessions via session ID | Sticky sessions up to 24 hours via dedicated ports |
| Concurrency | No hard cap while balance holds, fair-use throttling on unlimited plans | Explicitly unlimited concurrent sessions |
| Support | 24/7 live chat/email, dedicated AM on Enterprise tier | 24/7 live chat/email, dedicated AM on Corporate tier |
| Target user | Enterprise data teams, compliance-sensitive orgs, Fortune 500 | Scale-focused scraping teams, SEO/SERP tooling, mid-to-large dev teams |
Bright Data at a glance
Bright Data runs what it markets as the largest proxy network in the industry: 150 million-plus residential IPs across 195 countries, plus a separate 770,000+ datacenter pool, 1.6 million ISP (static residential) IPs, and roughly 7 million 3G/4G/5G mobile IPs, according to Bright Data’s own residential proxy documentation. The residential pool is sourced through an opt-in SDK monetization program, meaning end users consent to route traffic through their devices in exchange for something (usually a free app feature), and Bright Data has leaned hard into publishing third-party audits of that sourcing process. That compliance angle is a genuine differentiator if you’re at a company where legal or security review is part of vendor selection.
Pricing on the Bright Data residential pricing page starts at $8/GB pay-as-you-go with no minimum commitment, which drops with a recurring promo code to roughly $4/GB for the first three months. Committed plans step down further: $499/month buys 141GB at $3.50/GB, $999/month buys 332GB at $3.00/GB, and $1,999/month buys 798GB at $2.50/GB. Datacenter proxies run separately, priced per GB on shared pools (roughly $0.50-1.20/GB) or per IP-day on dedicated pools. ISP proxies are billed per IP per month rather than per GB, typically $1.50-3.00 depending on location and commitment.
The no-minimum pay-as-you-go option is worth calling out on its own. If you need proxies for a one-off scrape or an irregular monthly workload, Bright Data lets you buy exactly what you use without committing to a monthly floor, which Oxylabs’ tiered structure doesn’t offer.
Oxylabs at a glance
Oxylabs advertises a larger raw residential pool, 175 million-plus IPs across 195 countries, with heavy concentration in the US (10.3M), China (5.2M), Germany (3.5M), the UK (3.5M), and Australia (1.1M) among others. Targeting supports country, city, state, continent, ZIP, coordinates, and ASN. The pricing structure on Oxylabs’ residential proxy pricing page is a straightforward four-tier ladder: Starter at $30/month for 5GB ($6/GB), Basic at $100/month for 20GB ($5/GB), Advanced at $500/month for 125GB ($4/GB), and Corporate at $2,500/month for 1TB ($2.50/GB).
Oxylabs documents its session behavior in detail: rotating sessions run through port 7777 with a new IP on every request, and sticky sessions run through a port range (10000-100000) that holds the same IP for up to 24 hours, per Oxylabs’ session control documentation. Concurrency is explicitly marketed as unlimited, with no cap on simultaneous threads or connections, governed only by a general fair-use policy rather than a hard technical ceiling. ISP proxies start from around $1.60 per IP, and mobile proxies moved to a subscription-only model in March 2026 after Oxylabs dropped pay-as-you-go for that product, running from $7.50/GB at the entry tier down to $3.50/GB at the $2,500/month tier.
head-to-head
IP pool size
Oxylabs wins on the headline number: 175 million-plus residential IPs versus Bright Data’s 150 million-plus. Both networks span 195 countries, so the practical gap is smaller than the raw figures suggest, but if you’re running high-concurrency jobs against a single target with aggressive IP-based rate limiting, a larger pool means fewer repeat IPs per session. Bright Data compensates with a broader product spread: its 1.6 million ISP IPs and dedicated mobile pool give it more distinct proxy types to route around blocks that residential rotation alone can’t beat.
rotation control
Both networks support per-request rotation and sticky sessions, but the mechanics differ. Bright Data configures rotation through session parameters in the username string, giving fine control down to city, ASN, and carrier level for mobile targeting. Oxylabs uses a port-based system: one port for full rotation, a separate port range for sticky sessions. Oxylabs’ approach is arguably simpler to wire into existing tooling since the rotation behavior is set by which port you hit rather than by parsing session strings. I’d call this one close, with Bright Data ahead on targeting granularity and Oxylabs ahead on implementation simplicity.
geo coverage
Both claim 195 countries, which is effectively the entire internet-connected world, so this is a tie at the country level. The difference shows up at finer granularity. Bright Data’s mobile product supports carrier-level targeting, useful if you need to test how an app behaves specifically on, say, a Singtel or AT&T connection. Oxylabs supports city, ZIP, coordinates, and ASN targeting on its residential pool, which covers most scraping use cases without needing carrier-level precision. Unless carrier-specific mobile targeting is a requirement, this axis is a wash.
connection success rate
This is where vendor claims and independent benchmarks diverge the most, and it’s worth treating any single number skeptically. In an 11-provider benchmark run by Scrape.do, Bright Data posted a 98.44% average success rate, the highest in that specific test set. Other measurements put Oxylabs ahead, with a cited 99.95% average success rate on residential traffic and a 99.98% success rate specifically on ISP proxies in Proxyway’s testing, both with sub-second response times. Bright Data’s own published figures cite 99.95% success with P95 latency under two seconds on standard targets. The gap between these numbers depends heavily on which sites were tested and when, so I wouldn’t make a purchasing decision on success rate alone, run your own test against your actual target site before committing to a plan.
speed
Oxylabs has the edge in the numbers I could verify: a 0.6-second average response time on residential proxies and 0.18 seconds on ISP proxies in Proxyway’s benchmark. Bright Data cites P95 latency under two seconds, which is a different metric (95th percentile versus average) so it’s not a direct apples-to-apples comparison, but the general signal across independent reviews is that Oxylabs’ ISP and residential proxies respond faster on average. If your workload is latency-sensitive, like SERP scraping where you’re firing thousands of sequential queries, that speed difference compounds fast.
pricing per GB
At the top end, the two networks land in almost the same place: Bright Data hits $2.50/GB at $1,999/month for 798GB, Oxylabs hits $2.50/GB at $2,500/month for 1TB. Effectively the same per-GB rate, with Bright Data reaching it at a slightly lower total spend. At the entry end, Bright Data’s pay-as-you-go has no monthly minimum, so a small or irregular workload can cost less in absolute dollars even at a higher nominal per-GB rate. Oxylabs’ cheapest tier requires a $30/month commitment for 5GB. If your usage is lumpy or you’re testing before committing, Bright Data’s PAYG model avoids paying for GB you don’t use. If your usage is steady and predictable, Oxylabs’ tier ladder is easier to budget against.
session persistence
Oxylabs documents sticky sessions up to 24 hours through its dedicated port range, which is unusually long and well suited to multi-step flows like login sequences, cart-and-checkout automation, or any workflow where switching IP mid-session would break the session state entirely. Bright Data supports sticky sessions too, configured via session ID in the proxy username, but doesn’t publish as clear a maximum duration figure as Oxylabs does. For workflows that need one IP held for an entire day, like managing multiple logged-in accounts across a browser automation tool, Oxylabs’ documented 24-hour window is the safer bet on paper. If you’re building that kind of multi-account workflow, it’s worth reading how the people over at MultiAccountOps think about session and fingerprint consistency, since proxy session length is only half of what keeps an account stable.
concurrent connections
Oxylabs markets unlimited concurrent sessions with no documented thread or connection cap, governed only by a general fair-use policy. Bright Data has no hard concurrency limit either as long as your account balance covers usage, but its fair-use policy for unlimited plans caps traffic at 100GB per proxy per month, and exceeding that reduces available concurrent sessions for the rest of the billing period. In practice, both networks handle high-concurrency scraping fine at normal usage levels. Oxylabs’ policy is the cleaner one to reason about if you’re running a very high number of parallel threads without a clear cap in mind.
use-case verdicts
Enterprise-scale market intelligence and price monitoring: Bright Data. If you’re a Fortune 500 team or a data vendor that needs to answer “where do these IPs come from” in a procurement review, Bright Data’s documented opt-in SDK sourcing and third-party audit history matters more than a few cents of per-GB savings. The no-minimum PAYG option also makes it easier to pilot a new data source before locking into a contract.
SEO rank tracking and SERP monitoring: Oxylabs. When you’re firing large volumes of sequential search queries and latency stacks up fast, Oxylabs’ benchmarked 0.6-second average response time and dedicated SERP-focused tooling make a measurable difference in how many queries you can run per hour without getting flagged for unusual request patterns.
Ad verification and brand protection with mobile targeting: Bright Data. Carrier-level mobile proxy targeting is a narrower need, but if you’re verifying how ads render on a specific mobile carrier’s network in a specific country, Bright Data’s mobile product supports that granularity in a way Oxylabs’ residential-focused targeting doesn’t match.
Multi-account workflows and long-session automation: Oxylabs. The documented 24-hour sticky session window and unlimited concurrency make Oxylabs a more predictable choice for workflows managing multiple persistent sessions in parallel, like account management tools or browser automation that needs a stable IP across a full working day.
who should pick Bright Data
Pick Bright Data if compliance documentation matters to your legal or security team, if your usage is irregular enough that a no-minimum pay-as-you-go plan saves real money, or if you need carrier-level mobile targeting that Oxylabs doesn’t offer. It’s also the stronger choice if you’re already deep into Bright Data’s broader tooling ecosystem (Web Unlocker, Scraping Browser) and want proxies on the same billing relationship.
who should pick Oxylabs
Pick Oxylabs if speed is your bottleneck, if you’re running high-volume SERP or e-commerce scraping where response time directly affects throughput, or if you need long sticky sessions for multi-step or multi-account workflows. The flat tier pricing is also easier to forecast if your monthly usage is steady rather than sporadic, and the explicitly unlimited concurrency removes one variable from capacity planning.
verdict overall
Neither network is a strictly better product, they’re optimized for different operating profiles. Oxylabs wins on raw pool size, documented speed benchmarks, and session flexibility. Bright Data wins on compliance posture, billing flexibility for irregular usage, and mobile targeting granularity. If I had to generalize: teams running high-volume, latency-sensitive scraping (SEO tools, SERP APIs, e-commerce monitoring at scale) tend to get more out of Oxylabs, while teams that need documented IP sourcing for compliance review, or whose usage doesn’t fit a monthly tier cleanly, tend to get more out of Bright Data. Test both against your actual target sites before committing, since success rate and speed vary by target far more than either vendor’s marketing numbers suggest. For deeper dives on each, see our full Bright Data review and Oxylabs review, and check the blog for more head-to-head comparisons across the proxy market.
Written by Xavier Fok
disclosure: this article may contain affiliate links. if you buy through them we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. verdicts are independent of payouts. last reviewed by Xavier Fok on 2026-07-11.