Best for developers and AI teams that want proxies and scraping APIs from one account instead of separate proxy, search and unlocker vendors. Official SDKs cover 4 languages and an MCP server is included. The catch: certifications and IP sourcing are vendor-stated only, so test it on your own target sites before committing.
What changed
- · Update Thordata announces expansion of its residential proxy network source
Thordata is a proxy and web data service whose vendor-stated residential pool exceeds 100M IPs in 190+ locations. Alongside residential, mobile, static ISP, datacenter and high-bandwidth proxies it sells a SERP API, a Web Scraper API, Web Unlocker and a Scraping Browser, plus datasets for AI training, all managed from one dashboard.
About Thordata
Thordata is a proxy and web data provider headquartered in Hong Kong. Its own press materials say it was founded in 2018 and serves more than 4,000 enterprises, and its About page names the legal entity as HK Hengsheng Runzhi Technology Co., Limited with a team of 430+. Those are vendor-stated figures, and HokAI found no disclosed funding.
The catalog splits into two halves. The proxy half covers residential, mobile, static ISP, datacenter and high-bandwidth proxies. The scraping half adds a SERP API for search results, a Web Scraper API with ready-made scrapers for popular sites, Web Unlocker for pages that block scrapers, and a Scraping Browser that runs existing automation scripts. A dataset line, including video datasets aimed at model training, is sold by quote.
For AI projects the relevant pieces are the SERP API and the MCP server, which lets an agent call live search and receive JSON. The vendor also publishes plugins for n8n, LangChain and LlamaIndex. If you only need clean page text for an LLM, Firecrawl is a narrower alternative, and if you want ranked results from an AI search engine instead of raw search pages, compare Exa and Tavily in the AI search and retrieval infrastructure category.
Inside HokAI, the closest match for the SERP API is SearchApi, which bills per successful search. Olostep and Jina Search cover scraping and web search for agents, while Kernel and Notte are hosted cloud browsers, the category Thordata's Scraping Browser competes in. Browser agents such as Browser Use and Skyvern operate a real browser from a plain-English task; they are a different layer from a proxy network, which can sit beneath them.
Billing is the part to read before buying. Residential, mobile and browser traffic is prepaid in packages with a validity window, the search and unlocker APIs charge by successful request, and some target sites need identity checks before they open. Current prices are in the price notes and change often, so confirm them on the vendor pricing pages.
In June 2026 the company announced an expansion of its residential network, and its homepage now leads with a multimodal video dataset product for AI training.
Pricing
Prices read from thordata.com on 2026-10-29, in US dollars. Residential proxies are prepaid traffic packages: $2.00 for 1 GB, $1.80/GB at 10 GB, $1.50/GB at 50 GB, $1.00/GB at 150 GB, $0.80/GB at 350 GB, then $0.73, $0.70 and $0.65/GB at 1,000, 2,000 and 5,000 GB (the last package totals $3,250). The $0.65/GB rate shown in the site menu is that 5,000 GB package, not the entry price.
Mobile proxies run from $5.00 for 1 GB down to $2.20/GB at 500 GB ($1,100). High-bandwidth proxies are time-based: $280 for a day, $900 for 7 days, $2,370 for 30 days and $4,140 for 60 days. Datacenter and static ISP proxies are sold per IP; the site menu shows both from $0.75 per IP (list $1.50), but their per-duration tables did not load for HokAI, so confirm them before buying.
Monthly API tiers: SERP from $18 for 15,000 responses up to $700 for 1,000,000, and Web Unlocker from $13 for 10,000 responses up to $200 for 200,000. Prepaid credit packs: Web Scraper API from $30 for 30,000 credits up to $1,500 for 3,000,000, and Scraping Browser from $5 for 1 GB up to $1,250 for 500 GB. Datasets and enterprise plans are by quote.
Key Features
- Sticky and rotating residential sessions: Rotation can assign a new IP to every request, or a session ID can hold one IP for up to 90 minutes; the default is 10 minutes or 90 seconds of inactivity.
- Wide SERP engine coverage: The SERP API returns structured results for Google (web, AI Mode, Maps, News, Shopping, Jobs, Scholar, Trends and more), Bing, Yandex and DuckDuckGo, with city-level geo-targeting.
- Prebuilt site scrapers: The Web Scraper API covers 120+ domains, including Amazon, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, Zillow and Indeed, and delivers JSON, CSV or XLSX files.
- Remote browser for existing scripts: The Scraping Browser runs managed Chromium that accepts Playwright, Puppeteer and Selenium scripts, with CAPTCHA solving handled server-side according to the vendor.
- Open-source SDKs and agent plugins: MIT-licensed clients exist for Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, Go and Java, plus a Go MCP server and plugins for LangChain, LlamaIndex, Dify and n8n.
- Dataset marketplace: Video datasets and a dataset marketplace are sold next to the proxies, with pricing handled by quote through support.
Strengths
- First purchases can be as small as one gigabyte of residential traffic, so a failed trial costs little.
- Every self-serve residential, mobile, API and browser tier lists both unit price and total on the page, so a buyer can size an order without a sales call.
- Developer tooling is kept in the open: the Python SDK was updated in October 2026 and sits beside Go, Java and JavaScript clients.
- Product problems such as poor IP quality or duplicate charges are credited to a wallet balance, so a bad batch is not a total loss.
Weaknesses
- Compliance and sourcing claims cannot be checked: no named audit report or opt-in explanation for residential IP owners is published, and the certification badges on the About page are unlabeled images.
- The headline residential rate in the site menu belongs to the largest self-serve package, so small buyers pay roughly three times as much per GB.
- Prepaid traffic is valid for 30 days unless a later purchase reactivates it; only 1 TB enterprise plans, 1 TB mobile packages and wallet balances never expire.
- Web Unlocker bills any successful gateway response, even when the target site itself returned a 4xx error.
- Every account needs identity verification, and government, military, finance and messaging domains are blocked or gated, so some target lists will not work.
- No dated changelog or status history was found in its documentation index, so price and pool changes are visible only by re-reading pages.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does Thordata cost in 2026?
A single gigabyte of residential traffic costs $2.00, and the cheapest per-GB rate, $0.65, requires the 5,000 GB package. The search and unlocker APIs are monthly: SERP starts at $18 a month for 15,000 responses and Web Unlocker at $13 for 10,000. Mobile, browser, high-bandwidth and per-IP proxy pricing is itemised in the price notes.
Can you use Thordata without paying?
Only through trials; there is no permanent free tier. New accounts can request 100 MB of residential traffic by emailing support with a use case, and the SERP API, Web Scraper API and Web Unlocker each carry a 7-day trial. The vendor's own pages disagree on the SERP trial size (500, 1,000 and 5,000 responses all appear), so check the quota shown in the dashboard.
Which tools compete with Thordata in 2026?
Bright Data, Oxylabs and Decodo (formerly Smartproxy) appear beside it in third-party proxy comparisons, and none is listed on HokAI yet. Bright Data's menu shows residential proxies from $2.50/GB against a $5.00 list price on a promotion. For the API jobs, Firecrawl extracts pages as LLM-ready text, while Exa and Tavily return AI-ranked search results rather than raw search pages, at roughly $7 and $8 per thousand searches according to their HokAI records.
Is Thordata SOC 2 certified?
Its June 2026 press release says it holds SOC 2 Type 1 certification and a zero-data-retention policy. No audit report, certificate list or trust page appeared on thordata.com or in its documentation when HokAI checked, so treat it as a vendor claim until you have seen the report. A Type 1 report covers controls at one date, unlike a Type 2 review across a period.
How long does it take to get going with Thordata?
The slow step is identity verification, which the vendor says usually clears within minutes and which static ISP proxies require before purchase. After registering and verifying your email, buy a package or tier, generate an endpoint in the dashboard and connect over HTTP or HTTPS with your username and password. Add a session ID when you want a sticky session.