How to Use Proxies for Sneakers: Complete Guide
Gleb Lepeshkin
Gleb Lepeshkin Published: 2023/04/28

When it comes to buying a rare pair of one of those Adidas or Nike shoes you might have already faced the fact that the top-of-the-line sneakers are hard to buy: producers ship only limited batches that can be sold out within seconds from the renowned online stores. 

To compete for the cherished sneakers (for yourself or resell) you need to tool up with some things that will help you in the process of copping the rare footwear. You will most likely need a bot to place your order as fast as possible and a reliable proxy (or a set of proxies) to hide your real location or identity to be able to buy more than just a single pair.  

What is a sneaker proxy?

In this article we will cover some of the most important aspects of giving you the edge in buying sneakers online. You will find out what proxies to use and in what combinations to secure your purchase. Also, we highly recommend getting familiar with the sneaks slang here if you happen to come across abbreviations like BNIB, YOR or terms like copping or cook groups in your shopping for rare footwear. 

Depending on the location of the e-shop and the required speed of transaction you can choose from static residential IPs, residential rotating proxies and datacenter proxies for copping sneakers on the websites that have built-in anti-spam protection systems for detecting bots and proxies. With residential proxies you can be on the safe side in placing orders for products on multiple sites at the same time. 

Another thing that you should keep in mind while using sneaker proxies is geo-targeting. Some sites will be blocking orders from unknown or suspicious locations. So, here you can be more proactive and pick residential proxies from states or cities that will most likely help you secure the deal.

Like with any proxy-based operation you have an alternative with using free public proxies. But here you will have a huge risk of leaking your private and bank details to the third party and getting blocked on sneaker shops permanently.

What are sneaker proxies used for?

So, what are the best sneaker proxies? If you want to know how to use sneaker proxies the best way, you need to consider this. Depending on your buying strategy on sneaker sites, you may need various types of proxies. Of course, you can simply buy one pair from your own account and ask somebody to use their account to buy another pair for you. While it may sound quite doable, it also could appear unprofessional.

If you don’t want to depend on other people in copping the best sneakers in the market, your strategy needs to involve proxies for bots in bulk, while avoiding banning from the sites.

Another thing you will need is a reliable and fast bot to complete your copping mission. The bot does what a human buyer would do but at a much higher speed and more efficiently. Once you couple your bot with a residential proxy you will have in your hands a killer solution for placing the maximum number of orders on multiple sites without getting noticed.

Once you get good and reliable proxies from your proxy provider, you will be able to fit them right into your bot. The bot should be able to automatically authenticate the proxies and use a different IP upon every transaction on a sneaker site.

How to Use Proxies for Sneakers: Complete Guide

How to use proxies for sneakers

There are a whole lot of things that you have to take into account when you use proxies for copping sneakers online. Here is a list of tips that should help you in doing this thing more efficiently.

Tip 1 – Use residential or datacenter proxies

When you want to buy your sneakers online we advise you to use residential proxies. They will appear like legitimate mobile or desktop devices for the sites and will not be banned. 

However, if you have budget limitations and your primary concern is speed, you should consider using datacenter proxies instead of residential.

Tip 2 – Ensure top speed of your proxies

The limited-edition sneakers sell out at a super fast speed. We are talking about milliseconds that can win you a pair. So, taking that into account, it’s not only your bot that should be lightning fast but also your proxy pool.

Taking the speed factor into account, you can engage fast datacenter proxies. But if the geo restrictions of the site are the major concern, make sure that your proxy provider offers matching locations. Usually, residential proxies boast a better variety, although the average speed is somewhat slower.

Tip 3 – Engage location targeting

Location targeting (also referred to as geo-targeting) is an important thing to keep in mind for buying sneakers in a particular location (city, state, or country). It is crucial to place bets for sneakers with proxies with the shortest distance from the server of your target site. For instance, we at Privateproxy offer special geo-targeted proxies for European shoes marketplaces. 

So, if you are trying to buy Adidas shoes, you need to understand that using Adidas bots will not be enough. You will also need proxies close to the Adidas servers compatible with the bot. 

So, if you have a proxy from the same location as the Adidas server the chances are that you will succeed in your copping. Make sure your proxy provider gives you just the right IPs for this mission prior to the drop.

We at Privateproxy.me carefully study the cases of our customers and supply them with just the right residential proxy IPs for buying limited-edition sneakers online.

Tip 4 – Avoid free proxy

The word “free” may sound attractive but it also can mean a trap when we talk about proxies. When you use free proxies, the providers of such proxies will likely collect information about you or use your data in online scams. To avoid such problems we advise you to carefully pick a reliable proxy provider that will meet the following conditions: customer support available 24/7 to address all your concerns related to setting up and using proxies; wide proxy networks with IPs from locations that you will need for safe purchasing of items online; proven track record of successful operations in the market of proxies worldwide.  

Tip 5 – Set up your sneaker bot properly

As I mentioned before, the speed of your system for buying rare shoes is key. What it means for you is that you might need to set up a designated server powered with the right proxies for sneaker bots to complete the purchase operation in milliseconds.

One of the key components besides the proxies in your system is the bot that will let you cop the sneakers at a lightning speed. So, once you decide which site you are targeting, you can think of the bot you select for this mission. For instance, Nike Shoe Bot can be successfully used for a whole variety of Footsites but not really for Nike’s own platforms. Read this article to find out more on how to use Nike Shoe Bot or NSB.

So, if you are out there buying Nike shoes, one of the most reliable bots will be Better Nike Bot. This bot has built-in captcha solving features and has the ability to set random delays between requests. It even has a range of early release links and an almost flawless success rate in the business. But remember, no matter how good the bot is, it will be useless without a set of reliable sneaker bot proxies.

Tip 6 – Override anti-bot systems

Major sneaker sites like Nike, Yeezy, or other footsites all have their own proprietary sophisticated anti-bot systems meant to disclose any unauthorized activity on the sites. This means that you have to be careful when it comes to picking the right proxies for the job. On some sites one type of footsite proxies will be super successful and on others it may lead to a ban. 

To avoid any unsatisfactory performance of our proxies, we at Privateproxy.me will be available 24/7 to provide just the right pool of IPs for your specific application (in this case – proper mix of proxies for your mission).

Now, let’s consider in detail what types of proxies will be good for what types of sites to answer the question “How do sneaker proxies work in different situations?”:

  • If a site is famous for its anti-spam or anti-bot systems, consider using residential proxies;
  • If you need to be really fast on some site, since it can run out of stock in seconds, consider using datacenter proxies;
  • If you need to perform several tasks on a site, consider using residential proxies;
  • If you need to run a bot for an extended duration, consider using datacenter rotating proxies;
  • If you are looking for a more affordable solution, consider using datacenter proxies.

Consider PrivateProxy Your Trusted Partner 

We at Privateproxy.me have over a decade of experience providing our customers across the Globe with the best performing proxies. The use case of shoe proxies is very well common for us. We are ready to provide you with just the right pool of IPs for your copping mission if you contact our Customer Support on the live chat. So, do not hesitate to give us a shot, we will deliver right to your needs. We also provide proxy solutions for other missions involving scraping and parsing. So, if you are engaged, say, in web scraping for lead generation, we will be able to cater the right IPs for your operations.  

Final Thoughts

It is always nice to be able to cop a pair of rare sneakers before your opponents do. But this can be only possible when you have the right tools at your disposal. We can make sure that the bot you use for buying sneakers online will be powered by the ultimate proxies that will guarantee great outcomes. I hope in this guide we answered the question: “How to use proxies to cop sneakers?” So, best of luck in online shopping with proxies from Privateproxy.me.

Rate this article, if you like it:

Frequently Asked Questions

Please read our Documentation if you have questions that are not listed below.

  • What is a sneaker proxy?

    A sneaker proxy is essentially any proxy used for buying sneakers online. In most cases these are residential (more rarely datacenter) proxies used inside special bots (Ganesh, Cybersole AIO, etc.) to outbid buyers of rare footwear on ecommerce resources like official Nike, Adidas and Footlocker shops.

  • How do proxies work for sneakers?

    Depending on features and characteristics of online shops used for buying sneakers, you can choose from residential and datacenter proxies to meet your needs. For instance, if you learn that the shop has a sophisticated anti-bot system you will need to consider using residential proxies. And if the site requires from you some extra speed in securing the purchase, you will likely need to engage super-fast datacenter proxies.

  • What are sneaker proxies used for?

    Sneaker proxies are used to obfuscate your real IP for you to be able to purchase rare footwear online. Normally such proxies are coupled with special sneaker shops bots to place multiple or fast orders for sneakers.

Get 100% Clean DC & Residential Proxies

Contact Us