A residential IP address is an IP address assigned by an ISP to a home internet subscriber. It’s tied to a physical residential location — a house, flat, or home office. When you connect to the internet via your home broadband, you get a residential IP.
Residential IP vs Data Center IP
Not all IP addresses are equal. Websites can tell the difference:
- Residential IPs — Assigned by ISPs like BT, Comcast, or Vodafone to home users. Treated as trustworthy by most websites and anti-bot systems.
- Data center IPs — Assigned to servers in commercial data centres (AWS, Google Cloud, Hetzner). Commonly used by bots, scrapers, and VPNs. Often flagged or blocked by websites.
Why It Matters for VPNs
Most VPN providers use data center IPs. This is why Netflix, Hulu, and other streaming services can often detect and block VPN connections — they recognise the IP as coming from a data center, not a home. Residential VPNs route traffic through real home ISP IPs (usually sourced from users who share their connection), making them much harder to detect.
Why It Matters for Web Scraping and Automation
Websites with bot protection (Cloudflare, PerimeterX, DataDome) are far more likely to block data center IPs than residential ones. Businesses doing web scraping or automation at scale often pay significantly more for residential IP proxies for this reason.
How to Check If Your IP Is Residential or Data Center
Visit tools.examineip.com — your IP type (Residential, Hosting, Business, Mobile) is displayed in your IP details. You can also look up any IP using our WHOIS Lookup to see its registered organisation.
Static vs Dynamic Residential IPs
Most home ISPs assign dynamic residential IPs — the address changes periodically. Some ISPs offer static residential IPs for an additional fee, useful for running home servers or accessing work systems via IP allowlist. See our guide on dynamic vs static IP addresses for more detail.